(Web Desk) – Progress had been made in negotiations with the United States to end the war, Iran's parliamentary speaker said on Saturday night, but added the sides were still far from an agreement.
"We are still far from the final discussion," Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who is also one of Iran's negotiators, said in a national televised address, adding "we made progress in the negotiations, but there are many gaps and some fundamental points remain".
The US and Iran have a long way to go before reaching an agreement, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, he said.
“On some issues, conclusions have been reached in the negotiations, and on others not; we are still far from a final agreement,” Ghalibaf said.
Iran announced that it would close the Strait of Hormuz again on Saturday, citing repeated breaches of trust as the US maintained a naval blockade on Iranian ports.
Before that, Iran pushed for vessels to pay a fee for secure transfer across the waterway.
A senior Iranian official told the media that vessels that pay the fee were to be prioritised over those that do not pay.
The move has complicated negotiations with the US, but Ghalibaf framed the situation in the Strait of Hormuz as a strategic win for Tehran.
“We have not destroyed the enemy—they still possess money and weapons—but strategically, they have been defeated in the face of us,” he said.
US PREPARING TO SEIZE IRANIAN-LINKED SHIPS
The US is preparing to board and seize Iranian-linked ships to pile pressure on Tehran and force the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
The US military has drawn up plans to intercept tankers and commercial vessels in international waters, expanding its crackdown beyond the Middle East, the Wall Street Journal reported.
In tandem with a US blockade of Iranian ports, Donald Trump appears to be strengthening his economic chokehold on the regime.
Tensions have been rising between the US and Iran after the Islamic Republic closed the strait on Saturday morning, having reopened it the day before. It also fired on at least two container ships.
IRAN BLASTS EU ‘HYPOCRISY’ ON STRAIT OF HORMUZ
An Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps commander vowed the US would receive a “hard blow” if it attacked Iranian vessels.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei has assailed the European Union for “peak hypocrisy”, castigating the bloc for its “failure to practice what it preaches”. The spokesperson has shared an X post by EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, which states that under international law, waterways like the Strait of Hormuz must remain open and free of charge.
“Oh, that ‘international law’?! The one that the EU dusts off to lecture others while quietly green-lighting a US-Israeli war of aggression — and looking the other way on atrocities against Iranians?!” he writes on X. “Spare the sermons; Europe’s chronic failure to practice what it preaches has turned its ‘international law’ talk into peak hypocrisy.”
Baghaei states that no rule in international law prohibits Iran from taking measures to stop the Strait of Hormuz from being used for military purposes by a hostile nation.
“And ‘unconditional transit passage’ in Hormuz? That fiction sailed the moment US-Israeli aggression brought US military assets into the strait’s backyard,” he adds.
IRAN WARNS SHIPS APPROACHING HORMUZ ‘WILL BE TARGETED’
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Navy has warned that any vessels approaching the Strait of Hormuz “will be considered as cooperation with the enemy, and the offending vessel will be targeted”.
However, in violation of the ceasefire agreement, the American enemy has not lifted the naval blockade on Iranian vessels and ports, so the Strait of Hormuz will be closed from this afternoon until the blockade is lifted.
— Press TV (@PressTV) April 18, 2026“Iran’s IRGC warns that no vessel of any kind should move from its anchorage in the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman, stating that approaching the Strait of Hormuz will be considered as cooperation with the enemy, and the offending vessel will be targeted,” the force has said in a statement, carried by Iranian state broadcaster Press TV.
It additionally informs all vessels and their owners to only follow updates from official IRGC Navy channels, and that statements by US President Donald Trump on the Strait of Hormuz and the Persian Gulf “have no credibility”.