Gulf and Iranian foreign ministers postpone Strait of Hormuz talks in Oman
Yemen Herald News 
MUSCAT, Oman — Gulf and Iranian foreign ministers have postponed a meeting on reopening the Strait of Hormuz, Oman and Iran said, after Saudi Arabia objected.
The talks were set for Monday in the Omani port of Salalah. No new date has been given.
Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi announced the delay on Sunday, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported.
Mohammad Ali Bak, director-general of the Iranian foreign ministry’s Persian Gulf department, told IRNA the meeting was put off “at the request of some regional countries and by a joint decision of Oman and Iran.”
Iran’s foreign ministry said Saudi objection was the reason, according to Al Jazeera. The ministry gave no further detail.
Saudi Arabia had submitted amendments to the Iranian-Omani proposal, Axios and CNN reported. Riyadh was concerned the wording would set a new status quo in the waterway, those reports said.
Officials from Iran, Iraq and the Gulf Cooperation Council states had been due to attend.
Bahrain said it would not take part. Manama called participation appeasement and has said it will stay away until diplomatic ties with Iran are restored.
Tasnim, an outlet affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, claimed Israel pressed Bahrain to refuse. Bahrain has not responded to that claim.
The ministers were to examine temporary entry and exit routes for commercial ships through the strait. Iran and Oman were to share precise maps of the corridors.
The two countries are the only states with territorial waters in the Strait of Hormuz.
The inbound corridor would run through Iranian waters and the outbound corridor mostly through Omani waters, Al Jazeera reported. The plan could include voluntary tolls to fund navigation, environmental protection and search-and-rescue work.
Tehran has said the arrangement would not amount to reopening the strait.
The postponement follows the Houthi advance along Yemen’s Red Sea coast.
The group, formally Ansar Allah, took the port of Mocha on Sept. 10 and the island of Mayyun, also called Perim, the following day, according to Al Jazeera.
Those advances gave it the eastern side of Bab al-Mandab, the strait at the southern entrance to the Red Sea. Between 10 and 12 percent of world trade passes through it, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
The Houthis also seized the Hanish Islands and Zuqar Island in the southern Red Sea, Euronews reported.
The offensive against Yemeni government forces began on Aug. 6, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Attacks on the west coast started three days later with missile fire, suicide drones and explosive-laden boats.
Yemen’s armed forces media centre said on Sept. 13 that government troops had recovered ground near Bab al-Mandab. The Houthi movement disputes that account.
The United Nations said nearly 46,000 people had been displaced in Yemen since the fighting escalated, Al Jazeera reported on Sept. 11.
Saudi Arabia has faced repeated Houthi attacks during the offensive. It shut its East-West oil pipeline this month after drone attacks that Al Jazeera reported originated in Iraq.
Hours after the Salalah meeting was called off, Saudi civil defence issued alerts for Abha, Khamis Mushait, Jazan and Najran, Al Jazeera reported.
The Houthis said they had fired missiles and drones at military sites in Khamis Mushait in retaliation for air strikes in Yemen that the group blames on Saudi Arabia. Saudi authorities have not confirmed damage.
None of the governments involved said publicly that the postponement was linked to those attacks, according to Al Jazeera.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said Tehran would press ahead with its bilateral deal with Oman, which Iran says was finalised last month.
“In consultation with Oman, in the next step, we will make a decision on how to announce or register the agreement,” Baghaei told reporters on Monday.
Iran has said it will discuss the strait with the United States only if Washington lifts its naval blockade and returns to a memorandum of understanding agreed in June.
Ali Vaez, deputy director of the Crisis Group’s Middle East and North Africa programme, said Tehran wants regional endorsement to strengthen its hand.
“The broader the regional buy-in, the harder it becomes for the US to dismiss the arrangement as an Iranian diktat,” Vaez told Al Jazeera.
Thomas Juneau, an assistant professor at the University of Ottawa, said the Houthi gains in the Red Sea strengthen Iran’s position in any future talks with Washington.
“The Houthis are not a simple arm of Iranian foreign policy. They operate largely based on their own interests, and do not take and execute Iranian commands,” Juneau told Al Jazeera. “But Houthi and Iranian interests are largely, if not always fully, aligned.”
He said the group is trying to institutionalise what he called its veto on maritime traffic in the southern Red Sea.
Yemen’s internationally recognised government has accused Iran and its regional allies of supporting the offensive.
Iran says the Houthi gains cannot be separated from the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen that began in 2015.
Gulf states have seen energy receipts fall during the disruption to the strait.
Bahrain has been the target of repeated Iranian attacks since the war between Iran and the United States and Israel began at the end of February, Al Jazeera reported.
About the Author
