The 36th summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was held in Ankara, Türkiye, between July 7 and 8, convened in the shadow of two defining geopolitical crises.
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Greenland pushes back as the expanded U.S. consulate in Nuuk, Trump-era Arctic influence efforts, and resource politics fuel protests and diplomatic tension.
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President Trump and President Xi are set to meet for a formal state visit in Beijing.
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The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow channel of water between Iran and Oman, just 21 nautical miles across at its tightest point, through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil and LNG passes every day. For most of its modern history, the strait has functioned quietly. Tankers transit, insurance rates sit near zero, and Western drivers never hear the name. That changed on 28 February 2026, when Operation Epic Fury triggered the most serious disruption of Gulf shipping since the 1980s Tanker War.
The Strait of Hormuz connects the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and onward to the Arabian Sea. On its northern shore sits Iran; on its southern shore, the Musandam Peninsula belonging to Oman. At its narrowest, between Iran’s Larak Island and Oman’s Quoin Island, it measures roughly 21 nautical miles (EIA, 2025). Traffic moves through a formal two-lane scheme: inbound and outbound lanes roughly two miles wide, separated by a two-mile buffer. In a normal year, about 100 commercial ships pass through every day.
The strait is one of a handful of global chokepoints, narrow channels whose closure would strand entire economies. The EIA ranks Hormuz as the world’s most important oil transit chokepoint. In peacetime, it draws no attention because transit simply works.
In 2024, oil flow through Hormuz averaged 20 million barrels per day, about 20 percent of global petroleum liquids consumption and roughly 25 percent of all seaborne oil trade (EIA, June 2025). About 20 percent of global LNG trade also transits the strait, almost all from Qatar. The IEA estimates that 93 percent of Qatari and 96 percent of Emirati LNG exports depend on this single corridor.
Five countries account for over 93 percent of crude flows: Saudi Arabia (37 percent), Iraq (23 percent), the UAE (13 percent), Iran (11 percent), and Kuwait (10 percent). Pipeline bypass capacity is roughly 3.5 to 5.5 million barrels per day, against a normal flow of 20 million. The buyers are overwhelmingly Asian. In 2024, 84 percent of crude transiting Hormuz went to Asia. China alone took 38 percent, followed by India, South Korea, and Japan. According to Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, 45 to 50 percent of China’s crude imports normally transit Hormuz.
Al Jazeera estimates more than 500 billion US dollars of oil and gas flow through the strait annually, roughly 1.4 billion dollars every day.
On 28 February 2026, the United States and Israel launched coordinated strikes on Iranian nuclear, missile, and naval targets. According to a CSIS analysis, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed in the opening strike. He was succeeded by his son, Mojtaba Khamenei.
Iran’s response at sea was immediate. On 2 March, the IRGC declared the strait closed to “unfriendly nations.” Between 28 February and 12 April, Kpler and UK Maritime Trade Operations counted 22 confirmed attacks on commercial vessels. Transits collapsed from roughly 100 a day to just 279 in the first six weeks, a drop of about 92 percent. Qatar declared force majeure on LNG after Iranian drone strikes on Ras Laffan.
Brent crude, which had averaged 71 dollars per barrel in February, peaked around 128 dollars on 2 April. European TTF gas jumped 35 percent in a single session on 3 March. A two-week ceasefire announced on 8 April produced a brief price slide, but as of mid-April, IRGC gunboats have fired on tankers again and Brent has settled around 99 dollars.
Iran’s conventional navy is no match for the US Fifth Fleet. Yet it retains credible disruption power through asymmetric warfare and geography. The Iranian coastline runs about 950 miles along the strait, and seven islands (Abu Musa, Greater and Lesser Tunb, Qeshm, Hengam, Larak, and Hormuz) form what analysts call an “arch defence” across the shipping lanes.
The tools include an estimated 2,000 to 6,000 naval mines (CBS News, citing DIA), with unit costs as low as 1,500 dollars. The IRGC operates roughly 1,500 fast attack craft practising swarming tactics. Anti-ship cruise missiles (Noor, Qader) and ballistic anti-ship missiles (Khalij Fars family) cover the strait from shore. Shahed-136 drones and unmanned surface vessels have joined the arsenal. GPS jamming and spoofing have surged; Windward reported over 1,100 vessels affected in a single day in March 2026.
Iran also has a track record of tanker seizures: the Stena Impero (2019), the Advantage Sweet (2023), and the MSC Aries (2024).
The consensus from CSIS, RAND, and Chatham House: Iran probably cannot permanently close the strait against a sustained US response, but it can disrupt traffic for weeks or months, and even a handful of mines is enough to trigger the insurance panic that does the real economic damage.
Between 1984 and 1988, Iran and Iraq attacked more than 450 vessels during the Iran-Iraq War. The Reagan administration reflagged 11 Kuwaiti tankers under the US flag, launching Operation Earnest Will, the largest naval convoy operation since the Second World War. On 14 April 1988, USS Samuel B. Roberts struck an Iranian mine; four days later, the US Navy launched Operation Praying Mantis, sinking the frigate Sahand in the largest US surface engagement since 1945.
The lasting lesson was economic. Despite hundreds of attacks, fewer than 2 percent of Gulf shipping was disrupted. Iran concluded it could not win a naval war but could impose enormous cost through mines, small boats, and insurance panic. The post-1988 IRGC force structure flows directly from that conclusion.
Under Part III of the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, all ships enjoy a right of transit passage through straits used for international navigation (Article 38). Coastal states shall not hamper such passage, and there shall be no suspension of it (Article 44).
Iran signed UNCLOS in 1982 but never ratified it. Its 1993 Marine Areas Act claims only a right of innocent passage, requiring prior authorisation for warships. The dominant legal view, articulated by scholars such as James Kraska, is that UNCLOS transit-passage provisions reflect customary international law and bind Iran regardless of ratification.
Additional frameworks reinforce the point. The 1907 Hague Convention VIII forbids mines whose sole object is to intercept commercial shipping. The San Remo Manual treats indiscriminate mining of international straits as a violation of humanitarian law. UN Security Council Resolution 552 (1984) condemned attacks on neutral Gulf shipping. On 7 April 2026, a Bahrain-sponsored resolution to secure the strait was vetoed by Russia and China.
Marine insurance is the hidden mechanism that translates military risk into economic paralysis. Four policies keep a ship sailing: Hull and Machinery (covers the ship), Protection and Indemnity (covers liabilities like pollution and crew injury), Cargo insurance (covers the goods), and War Risk insurance (covers mines, missiles, seizure, and hostile acts). The first three explicitly exclude war; the fourth must be purchased separately.
The gatekeeper is the Lloyd’s of London Joint War Committee, which publishes a list of high-risk waters. When an area is listed, any ship entering it must pay an Additional War Risk Premium, typically as a seven-day cover for a single voyage. On 3 March 2026, the JWC expanded its listed areas to include the entire Arabian Gulf.
In peacetime, war risk premiums for Hormuz ran about 0.025 to 0.05 percent of hull value. After 28 February, Lloyd’s List reported premiums surging to 1.5 to 3 percent, and up to 5 percent for US, UK, or Israeli-connected ships. For a 138 million dollar supertanker, that means 10 to 14 million dollars per transit, adding roughly 5 to 7 dollars to the cost of every barrel carried.
The deeper point: insurance panic can close a strait without a single mine being laid. Banks, charterers, and flag-state regulators will not authorise sailings without cover. When premiums spike or cover is withdrawn, tankers simply stop. Lloyd’s data show Hormuz traffic falling more than 80 percent in early March 2026, days before most mines were deployed.
Roughly one-fifth of global oil and LNG, valued at half a trillion dollars a year, flows through a 21-mile channel bordered by one of the world’s most sanctioned regimes. For four decades, the system worked because closing the strait would hurt Iran’s own customers, above all China. Operation Epic Fury has stress-tested that equilibrium. What the crisis has revealed is that Iran does not need to close the strait to shake the global economy. A handful of drones, a few mines, and a Lloyd’s market listing are enough to move the price of oil by 30 dollars and stall 90 percent of traffic. The strait’s long quiet made the world forget how narrow the margin really is.
Last updated: April 2026. Sources include the US Energy Information Administration, International Energy Agency, CSIS, Lloyd’s List, Al Jazeera, Columbia University CGEP, Lawfare, CBS News, Lloyd’s Joint War Committee, and Windward Maritime AI.
THE MIDDLE EAST, Apr. 7 – The United States and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire, offering a pause and potential off-ramp in the fast-growing regional war that had threatened to further disrupt global energy markets. The agreement, announced by President Donald Trump, was brokered by Pakistani mediators and is tied to Iran’s commitment to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping.
The truce emerged only hours before Mr. Trump’s deadline for potential strikes against Iranian infrastructure, including power plants and bridges. Mr. Trump said the U.S. would suspend offensive operations for two weeks, describing the ceasefire terms as a workable basis for broader negotiations. Iranian officials, however, framed the deal more cautiously, signaling that Tehran views the pause as conditional and temporary rather than as a final solution. Reuters reported that Iran had demanded a full halt to U.S. strikes, guarantees against future attacks, compensation for war damages, and recognition of Iran’s right to enrich uranium as conditions for any lasting peace.
The Strait of Hormuz is central to the current deal. The waterway handles a significant share of the world’s maritime oil traffic, and its disruption had spiked the price of crude oil and intensified fears of a wider economic crisis. News of the ceasefire sent oil prices lower and lifted financial markets, reflecting investor hopes that the agreement could prevent any further crisis.
Still, the ceasefire’s feasibility is far from certain. The Associated Press and Reuters both reported that military activity and missile alerts continued in parts of the region and in Israel even after the announcement, underscoring the difficulty of translating high-level diplomatic understanding into an immediate halt on the ground. Israel, according to multiple reports, has also been folded into the arrangement, though fighting linked to Hezbollah and other regional fronts has not fully stopped.
For now, the agreement is offering a narrow off-ramp rather than a lasting peace. The two-week pause may create space for negotiations in Islamabad and further back-channel diplomacy, but the gap between Washington’s call for a temporary halt and the opening of the Strait, and Tehran’s demand for permanent guarantees, remains substantial. Whether this is the start of a broader settlement or just a brief interruption in the conflict will likely depend on what happens next in both the Strait of Hormuz and the negotiations in Islamabad.
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On Friday, U.S. forces struck over 90 targets designated as military infrastructure belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The strikes destroyed naval mine storage facilities, missile bunkers, various air defense systems, and other strategic points of interest while keeping the oil infrastructure on the island intact.
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Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was eliminated during joint U.S.-Israeli strikes in Tehran. His death marks a new chapter in Iranian history, one where the regime’s nuclear threat is no longer a reality.
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President Donald Trump will deliver the 2026 State of the Union tonight, February 24, starting at 9:00 p.m. Eastern. Faytuks Network is kicking off live coverage ahead of the speech with updates, key lines in context, and what it signals for the months ahead.
Expect a heavy focus on the economy and the White House pitch to “working families,” along with a familiar emphasis on law and order, the military, and immigration enforcement. Trade will also likely be in the spotlight after recent legal turbulence around tariffs, and the administration is expected to frame the address as a broader argument that the United States is being “respected again” abroad. Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger will deliver the Democratic Response.
U.S. President Donald Trump has established a new 10-15 day deadline for Iran to agree to a “meaningful” concession on Washington’s demands or face serious consequences. On Thursday, speaking with reporters aboard Airforce one, he said “I would think that would be enough time, 10, 15 days, pretty much maximum.” After the ending of indirect negotiations in Geneva over Tehran’s nuclear enrichment, ballistic program and proxy affiliation, Trump warned that the United States will decide within given deadline whether to pursue further military action.
Speaking at the inaugural meeting of the newly formed “Board of Peace” in Washington, Trump reiterated that the U.S. wants a diplomatic solution but signalled impatience with the pace of talks. “We have to make a meaningful deal otherwise bad things will happen,” he said, with this firm time frame being “pretty much maximum” for a diplomatic solution.
The deadline comes amid a significant U.S. military buildup in the Middle East and ongoing diplomatic efforts, underscored by a U.S. military buildup that includes two aircraft carrier strike groups, the USS Abraham Lincoln & USS Gerald R. Ford, supported by guided-missile destroyers and other assets positioned across the Persian Gulf and Arabian Sea. The buildup also includes advanced fighter aircrafts, surveillance platforms, aerial refuelling tankers, and reinforced Patriot and THAAD missile defence systems at multiple regional bases.
On Friday, Iranian FM Araghchi appeared on MS Now saying Tehran has not offered to suspend its nuclear or ballistic missile programs, and that the United States has not demanded this under current negotiation guidelines. He added that Iran expects to submit a formal proposal to Washington by end of the week , pending the approval of senior Iranian leadership. Tehran reiterated that talks will remain confined to the subject of Iran’s nuclear program, rejecting discussions on missile limitations or regional proxies—underscoring the enduring gaps between U.S. and Iranian positions.
As the deadline approaches, Tehran has warned that all U.S. bases and assets in the region will be considered legitimate targets in the event of military action. For Washington, the coming days represent a narrowing diplomatic window in which to secure a framework that meets their policy objectives: the dismantling of the Iranian nuclear program, and reduction of their missile program and proxy support. Failure on the diplomatic front could mean both sides must prepare for a high-stakes conflict that could threaten regional stability.
Spokeswoman for Russia’s Foreign Ministry Zakharova calls Zelensky a “terrorist outcast”. Credit: REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov
Russian officials are vowing a strong response to what they describe as a “terrorist attack” using 91 Ukrainian UAVs against Putin’s Valdai residence in Novgorod oblast. Russia’s Ministry of Defence says all drones were intercepted with no casualties or damage being reported.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says that Russia’s Armed Forces have deemed “how, with what, and when to respond” to Ukraine’s ‘terrorist attack’. Ukrainian monitoring channels have previously warned of a large Russian attack coinciding with New Year’s Eve. Putin told Trump that “Kiev’s terrorist actions” will not go unanswered, according to Russia’s TASS state news agency.
Spokeswoman for Russia’s Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova also ramped up the rhetoric by calling Ukrainian President Zelensky a ‘terrorist outcast’, vowing that a strong response is coming. Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, also said that Zelensky would “have to stay in hiding for the rest of his worthless life”.
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that the timing and nature of Russia’s response to “Kyiv’s state terrorism” has been decided
Ukraine denies
Ukraine vehemently denies being behind the reported drone attack against Putin’s residence, with President Zelensky saying that it is “a complete fabrication intended to justify additional attacks against Ukraine”. Zelensky and other Ukrainian officials have told Ukrainians to remain vigilant, warning that Russia is preparing ground to “strike Ukraine’s government buildings in Kyiv”
No evidence has been provided by Russia of the attack on Putin’s residence. Local residents have told independent Russian outlet SOTA that no air defence activity was heard in the proximity of Putin’s residence last night.
A source close to French President Macron told Reuters on Tuesday there was no evidence to corroborate Russia’s claims that Ukraine targeted Putin’s residence. Asked by reporters, Kremlin spokesman Peskov said there was no need to provide evidence of the attack.
Peace Negotiations
Russian officials have signalled a switch in their approach to the ongoing peace negotiations with Ukraine. Kremlin Spokesman Peskov said Russia would toughen its negotiating position. It’s not immediately clear what this would entail as no further information has been provided.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told Russian State Media that Trump told Putin that the drone attack would affect American approaches to working with Zelensky. US officials have not confirmed this.
International reactions
US President Donald Trump told press that he was angry when President Putin told him about the attack on his residence. In a phone call with the Russian leader, Trump reportedly said “Thank God, we did not give Tomahawks to Ukraine”, according to Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov.
India, Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates and Nicaragua have condemned the purported attack against Putin’s residence. India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a post on X that he was “Deeply concerned by reports of the targeting of the residence of the President of the Russian Federation”.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha says they were “disappointed and concerned to see the statements by Emirati, Indian, and Pakistani sides expressing their concerns regarding the attack that never happened.
Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia have condemned the Kremlin for what they deem a false flag operation to justify possible strikes against Ukraine. Latvia’s Foreign Minister Baiba Braže said in response to the Russian claims that “The Kremlin butcher needs war, not peace, to justify existence”.
