{"id":699263,"date":"2026-04-02T09:11:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T09:11:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/699263\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T09:11:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T09:11:20","slug":"uk-gathers-countries-to-discuss-reopening-the-strait-of-hormuz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/699263\/","title":{"rendered":"UK gathers countries to discuss reopening the Strait of Hormuz"},"content":{"rendered":"

LONDON (AP) \u2014 Almost three dozen countries will meet Thursday in an effort to exert diplomatic and political pressure to reopen the Strait of Hormuz<\/a>, a vital shipping route that has been choked off by the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran<\/a>.<\/p>\n

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer<\/a> said the virtual meeting chaired by Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper \u201cwill assess all viable diplomatic and political measures we can take to restore freedom of navigation, guarantee the safety of trapped ships and seafarers and to resume the movement of vital commodities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iranian attacks on commercial ships, and the threat of more, have halted nearly all traffic in the waterway that connects the Persian Gulf to the rest of the globe\u2019s oceans, shutting a critical path for the world\u2019s flow of oil<\/a> and sending petroleum prices soaring.<\/p>\n

The U.S. is not among the countries attending Thursday\u2019s meeting. Trump has said securing the waterway is not America\u2019s job<\/a>, and told U.S. allies to \u201cgo get your own oil.\u201d<\/p>\n

No country appears willing to try and open the strait by force while fighting rages and Iran can target vessels with anti-ship missiles, drones, attack craft and mines. But Starmer said Wednesday that military planners from an unspecified number of countries will meet soon to work on how to ensure security for shipping \u201cafter the fighting has stopped.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the meantime, 35 countries including the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Japan and the United Arab Emirates have signed a statement demanding Iran stop its attempts to block the strait and pledging to \u201ccontribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage\u201d through the waterway.<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s meeting is considered a first step, to be followed by \u201cworking-level meetings\u201d of officials to hammer out details.<\/p>\n

Starmer said resuming shipping \u201cwill not be easy,\u201d and will require \u201ca united front of military strength and diplomatic activity\u201d alongside partnership with the maritime industry.<\/p>\n

The international effort idea has echoes of the international \u201ccoalition of the willing\u201d that has been assembled, led by the U.K. and France, to underpin Ukraine\u2019s security after a future ceasefire in that war. The coalition is, in part, an attempt to demonstrate to the Trump administration that Europe is stepping up to do more for its own security.<\/p>\n

The urgency of stronger continental defenses has been reinforced by Trump\u2019s renewed suggestion that the U.S. could pull out of NATO.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LONDON (AP) \u2014 Almost three dozen countries will meet Thursday in an effort to exert diplomatic and political…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":699264,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[64,69,10102,57,3464,83,6087,17723,8132,50,53197,80,5503,376,4338,17344,103,107,120165],"class_list":["post-699263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","tag-business","tag-donald-trump","tag-energy-industry","tag-general-news","tag-international-agreements","tag-iran","tag-iran-war","tag-keir-starmer","tag-military-and-defense","tag-news","tag-oil-and-gas-industry","tag-politics","tag-strait-of-hormuz","tag-united-kingdom","tag-united-kingdom-government","tag-waterways","tag-world","tag-world-news","tag-yvette-cooper"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116334342167448455","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=699263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/699263\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/699264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=699263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=699263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=699263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}