Seven months into a grinding U.S.-Iran conflict, negotiators from both sides have quietly restarted indirect talks aimed at reopening the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway that carries roughly a fifth of the world's oil, officials on both sides indicated this week.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi has proposed reopening the strait and resuming nuclear negotiations within seven days if the United States lifts its naval blockade of Iranian ports, waives sanctions on Iranian oil sales, and agrees to a ceasefire extending to Lebanon. Iran floated the offer on the sidelines of last week's United Nations General Assembly, where President Trump and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian traded pointed warnings from the same podium days apart.

Publicly Rejected, Privately Alive

Trump rejected Iran's latest proposal outright, according to reporting cited by PBS NewsHour. But mediators — believed to include Qatari and Omani officials who have shuttled between Washington and Tehran throughout the conflict — are continuing to work both sides toward a deal, with a new round of indirect talks expected to resume this week.

"POSITIVE AND CONSTRUCTIVE."

That's how U.S. officials have described the broader trajectory of the Hormuz talks, even as the headline proposal was turned down. The strait, just 21 miles wide at its narrowest point between Iran and Oman, normally carries about 21 million barrels of oil a day — worth roughly $1.2 billion — along with nearly a quarter of the world's liquefied natural gas supply. Iran's partial blockade since the war began has kept global oil prices elevated for months.

Global oil markets have stayed on edge throughout the standoff, with crude trading well above pre-war levels since Iranian forces began restricting traffic through the strait. Analysts caution that even a signed deal could take weeks to translate into normalized shipping, given the naval mine-clearing and insurance recalibration commercial vessels would need before resuming regular transits.

The renewed push comes as U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said this week that a month of sanctions has "scared off" Iran's neighbors from doing business with Tehran and is drying up its oil revenue, with Iran reportedly rushing to complete final oil deliveries to China before the squeeze tightens further. Iran has floated similar seven-day proposals before, only to see them collapse over disagreements on sequencing — Tehran wants sanctions relief before reopening the strait, Washington has pushed for the reverse — and neither government has set a public deadline for this round.