By Naeema Saleem — SCN News
NEW YORK — Iran has proposed reopening the Strait of Hormuz within seven days and restarting negotiations with the United States if Washington lifts its naval blockade, grants sanctions relief for Iranian oil exports and observes a broader ceasefire that would extend to Lebanon, putting a concrete timetable on Tehran’s latest attempt to revive diplomacy after months of war and disruption to one of the world’s most important energy corridors.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi outlined the proposal during a private gathering on the sidelines of the 81st United Nations General Assembly in New York on Thursday. He said Tehran had already transmitted the plan to Washington through intermediaries and that implementation could begin immediately if the Trump administration accepts the conditions.
Araghchi said the Strait could be opened at the end of a seven-day implementation period, after which negotiations toward a more permanent settlement would resume. The proposal therefore links restoration of commercial shipping through Hormuz directly to a wider political and military understanding between Washington and Tehran rather than treating the waterway as a separate maritime dispute.
The terms described so far are substantial. Iran wants the United States to lift its naval blockade, provide waivers allowing Iranian oil exports and observe a ceasefire that includes Lebanon. Tehran would in return reopen the Strait and return to negotiations over its nuclear programme and a broader settlement of the conflict.
The seven-day timetable is new, but much of the substance is not. Araghchi said Tehran was not presenting fundamentally new demands and described the proposal as being within the framework of the earlier understanding reached through Pakistani and Qatari mediation. Iran and the United States signed the Islamabad Memorandum of Understanding in June after an earlier Pakistan-mediated ceasefire, but implementation later collapsed as hostilities and attacks on shipping resumed.
That connection gives the latest proposal particular significance for Pakistan. Islamabad has spent much of UNGA81 trying to revive its mediation role, and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian told Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif this week that the Islamabad framework remained acceptable to Tehran. The latest proposal from Araghchi indicates that Iran is now attempting to translate that position into a specific implementation timetable.
The central problem is sequencing.
Washington wants the Strait reopened and unrestricted passage restored before surrendering the economic and military leverage created by its blockade. Tehran wants tangible U.S. concessions before relinquishing the leverage it derives from restrictions on one of the world's most strategically important shipping routes. Sources familiar with the discussions have described that question — which side moves first — as a central obstacle to an agreement.
Hormuz gives Iran enormous negotiating leverage because of the waterway's importance to international energy markets. Before the war, roughly a fifth of global oil and gas shipments moved through the Strait, connecting Gulf producers with international markets. Continued disruption has therefore transformed what began as a regional military confrontation into a direct threat to energy prices, shipping and the global economy.
For Washington, reopening Hormuz would remove one of the most economically damaging consequences of the conflict. For Tehran, however, giving up restrictions without obtaining relief from the American blockade and sanctions could mean surrendering one of its strongest bargaining tools before a final agreement has been secured.
The White House has consequently shown little public urgency to accept Tehran's timetable. A U.S. official said Washington and Tehran were holding “positive and constructive discussions” through intermediaries but declined to endorse Araghchi's proposal. The administration maintains that Trump believes the United States is negotiating from a position of strength and therefore does not need to rush into an agreement.
That position mirrors Trump's own message at the United Nations this week. Rather than publicly embracing Iran's diplomatic opening, he called for greater international economic isolation of Tehran and said he believed an agreement could emerge after the U.S. midterm elections in November.
Araghchi has now put a different timetable on the table. He indicated that Tehran would prefer an agreement before the November elections but said Iran was not desperate for one and that the decision ultimately rested with Washington.
The political calendar matters because prolonged disruption in Hormuz has pushed energy costs higher and added to cost-of-living pressures in the United States and elsewhere. A rapid reopening could ease pressure on oil markets before Americans vote on Nov. 3, giving both the economic consequences and timing of an agreement a domestic U.S. political dimension.
Iran is also under mounting economic pressure. Washington has expanded sanctions beyond shipping and oil into aviation, threatening foreign companies that continue servicing Iranian airlines. Iranian flights to several neighbouring countries have subsequently been curtailed, tightening Tehran's regional connections while the naval blockade constrains its wider economy.
Those pressures create incentives for Tehran to seek an agreement, but Iran is simultaneously signalling that it will not negotiate on the basis of surrender. Pezeshkian told the General Assembly this week that Iran “cannot be made to surrender,” while maintaining that diplomacy remains possible. Araghchi's proposal fits that approach: Tehran is offering a route toward reopening Hormuz, but only as part of reciprocal U.S. steps.
The proposal is also wider than a bilateral shipping agreement. Requiring a ceasefire that includes Lebanon links the Hormuz negotiations to the broader network of Middle East conflicts, making any agreement potentially dependent on military developments involving actors beyond Washington and Tehran.
That broader regional dimension could make negotiations harder, but it also suggests Tehran is attempting to use a Hormuz settlement as the starting point for a wider de-escalation framework.
Pakistan and Qatar could become particularly important if talks advance. Both have previously acted as intermediaries, and Pakistan has used meetings during UNGA81 to argue that instability around Hormuz, Yemen and Bab al-Mandab must be addressed through coordinated diplomacy rather than allowing the conflicts to reinforce one another.
There is still no agreement. The White House has not accepted the Iranian proposal, and the public details do not show that Washington has agreed to lift the blockade, grant the requested oil waivers or accept Tehran's ceasefire conditions. Reports earlier this week about a seven-day Iranian proposal were also disputed by an Iranian semi-official outlet, making Araghchi's subsequent public description of a plan in New York important confirmation that Tehran has indeed now put forward such a framework.
The development therefore represents an opening rather than a breakthrough.
What has changed is the specificity of the offer. Iran is no longer merely saying it could reopen Hormuz if Washington reduces pressure. Its foreign minister has publicly described a mechanism under which U.S. acceptance would start a clock and the Strait would reopen seven days later while negotiations restart.
That leaves Washington facing a consequential choice. Accepting the framework could potentially restore traffic through the world's most important oil chokepoint and reopen negotiations relatively quickly, but would require concessions that could weaken some of the pressure the Trump administration has deliberately built against Tehran.
Rejecting it would preserve that leverage but could prolong disruption around Hormuz and the economic consequences associated with the conflict.
For now, the strongest development from New York is therefore not that Hormuz is reopening — it is not yet. It is that Iran has put a seven-day route to reopening on the table, tied it to the earlier diplomatic framework developed through intermediaries, and placed the next major decision squarely before Washington.