Iran ties Hormuz to seven conditions as mine claims mount and Maersk adds a Gulf surcharge
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Iran’s seven conditions put Hormuz behind a price Washington has not agreed to pay
Iran has put a price on reopening the Strait of Hormuz, and it has seven parts. “As long as they do not execute our seven conditions, we will neither open the Strait of Hormuz nor have negotiations,” Mohsen Rezaei, described as Iran’s top security official, said on Thursday 5 November. The Jerusalem Post reported the quote, citing Reuters. Iran has not published the full list. The reported demands include ending US sanctions, releasing frozen Iranian assets and paying war reparations.
On the same day, Iranian forces claimed that more tankers had hit mines and caught fire in and near the strait. Al Jazeera’s count is at least five tankers and a tugboat damaged. None of these claims has been independently verified.
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Our view is simple. Hormuz is no longer just a security problem that ends when the shooting stops. Iran has made it a bargaining chip, tied to demands the US has shown no sign of accepting. Forwarders should stop planning around a sudden reopening and price Gulf cargo for a long closure.
What Iran said and claimed on 5 November
Rezaei, speaking in Russia, said: “On the issue of diplomacy, we have announced seven conditions to the Americans.” According to the Jerusalem Post, Iran also sent a nuclear proposal to the US via Qatar, “to be discussed only after Washington meets Tehran’s seven demands.” The Iranian official said the US was reviewing it. Washington has said nuclear issues must be part of any initial negotiations.
President Trump was asked whether he had seen the Iranian proposal. He replied: “They’re [Iran] not doing anything without our approval.” He added: “It doesn’t make a difference what they’re looking at; they’re not going to have a nuclear weapon.”
That is two sides stating opposite starting points in public on the same day. Each wants the other to move first.
At sea, the claims came from two Iranian forces. The Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) said a tanker “attempting to pass through the illegal passageway south of the Strait of Hormuz suffered a fire after striking a mine and was brought to a halt.” That is CBS News’s rendering of the claim. The IRGC also said, as quoted by Al Jazeera, that “Another supertanker was halted by a massive fire while exiting the eastern Strait of Hormuz.” It said a tug sent to fight that fire “also caught fire”. Iran’s army said that two more tankers “struck naval mines and caught fire” in waters east of the strait. The National’s live coverage summarised it as: “Iranian navy says three tankers hit naval mines and caught fire on Thursday”.
No ship names, flags or casualties were given. The pattern does matter, though. This is the second day running of mine claims. On 4 November, CBS reported an IRGC claim that “Four non-compliant oil tankers attempting to pass through the prohibited passage south of the Strait of Hormuz” were destroyed after hitting naval mines. Iran’s message is that ships using routes it has not approved will be hit.
There are also attacks that Iran has not claimed. Late on 4 November, the UK Maritime Trade Operations agency (UKMTO, the British military’s shipping-incident desk) reported a tanker struck off Qatar. CBS’s live blog put it as a tanker “hit by two unidentified projectiles about 50 nautical miles north of Madinat ash Shamal, Qatar.” Al Jazeera says attacks on Gulf tankers “are still running close to a record pace”. It notes UKMTO said it was “struggling to accurately report” the true number, because most ships now refuse to report them. That makes any official count a floor, not a ceiling.
Why diplomacy will not move freight this month
There is real mediation going on. Al Jazeera reports that Qatar “has stepped up mediation efforts to resume talks on ending the war in recent days.” On 4 November, CBS relayed a Reuters report from the day before that Qatari mediators “expect feedback within 36 hours from Iranian and U.S. negotiators on new ideas.”
But feedback is not a deal, and a deal is not a reopened strait. Our reasoning is about sequence. Iran says no talks and no strait until the US delivers. The US says nothing happens without its approval and insists on nuclear terms up front. Even if both sides blinked this week, someone would still have to clear mines. Navies would have to agree on safe routes. Insurers would have to re-rate the risk. Carriers would have to rebuild rotations that have been suspended for most of this year. Each of these steps takes weeks.
The backdrop is not calm either. Al Jazeera cites unnamed Pentagon officials telling the New York Times that US forces are “poised to resume major combat operations against Iran” if ordered. Iran’s Supreme Leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, said there should not be “even the slightest inclination towards submission” to the US.
What happened last time a deal looked close
This year has already shown how fragile paper progress is for shipping costs. Insurance Business reported in September that, before the war began on 28 February, hull war-risk insurance for Hormuz transits cost “around 0.15% to 0.25% of vessel value.” (War-risk insurance is the extra cover a ship needs to enter a conflict zone, priced as a share of the ship’s value.) After the first US and Israeli strikes, Marsh’s global head of marine, Marcus Baker, put premiums at between 3% and 10%. In August, Business Insurance reported rates for Hormuz transits remained “at about 10%.”
The same Insurance Business piece describes what happened after a memorandum of understanding was signed in June. Neil Roberts of the Lloyd’s Market Association described a “softening” in premiums. Then three vessel attacks in the first week of July brought an “uptick”. In other words, the market eased on a signature and tightened again on the next attack. On 5 November, the attacks are still being claimed while the talks are only being proposed.
Traffic tells the same story. Insurance Business, citing reporting used by Marsh, says an average of 178 ships a day transited Hormuz before the conflict. That fell by around 95% after hostilities began.
What this means for Gulf box cargo
Container lines have been working around the strait for months. In March, Maersk’s Dubai-based regional managing director, Charles van der Steene, told Reuters the company moved about 35,000 containers a week in and out of the Gulf before the conflict. Those volumes were being moved onto “landbridge” routes instead. This means ships unload at ports outside the strait, such as Jeddah, Salalah, Sohar and Khor Fakkan, and the cargo then goes by truck to Gulf destinations. He said Jeddah volumes were up 40% since the conflict began.
Carriers now expect that workaround to last into peak season, and they are charging for it. On 4 November, Maersk filed a revised peak season surcharge (PSS, an extra charge carriers add when demand is high) from Far East Asia to the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and Dammam in Saudi Arabia. The amounts are USD 1,000 per 20ft container and USD 2,000 per 40ft or 45ft. It applies from 16 November for most Asian origins, including China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and most of Southeast Asia. Vietnam follows on 19 November and South Korea on 22 November. Maersk calls it a “revision” but does not give the previous level.
For forwarders, three practical points follow.
First, re-quote. Any Asia–Gulf booking sailing from 16 November needs the new PSS on top of whatever war-risk or emergency charges are already in the rate. A quote issued last week without it is likely short by up to $2,000 a box.
Second, keep buffers wide. Landbridge routes depend on trucks, border crossings and port capacity at Jeddah and the Omani and UAE east-coast ports. Peak-season volume plus any new attack near those ports can add days. Tell shippers that delivery dates into Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and Dammam are estimates, not promises.
Third, watch the insurance market, not the oil price. Crude has swung sharply around the US midterms. Shipping costs into the Gulf follow war-risk premiums and carrier surcharges, and both respond to attacks. A falling Brent price does not mean cheaper Gulf freight.
Our call
We think Iran’s seven conditions make a quick reopening less likely, not more. Iran has tied the strait to sanctions, frozen assets and reparations, which no US administration is likely to concede quickly. Meanwhile, its forces are claiming mine strikes on ships that try routes it has not approved.
Our prediction: no major carrier restores a regular scheduled container service through Hormuz into the Upper Gulf (the ports inside the strait, such as Kuwait, Dammam, Bahrain and Qatar) before 1 December 2026. We also expect Gulf war-risk and emergency surcharges from the big carriers to stay in place through December. Maersk’s $2,000 per 40ft Asia–Gulf PSS will take effect on 16 November as filed. Even a breakthrough from the Qatari mediation this month would take weeks to reach a container schedule.
Sources
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