Iran plans a new restricted zone near Hormuz as Qatar tests its way back through

Iran is drawing a new line around Hormuz: Tehran plans to announce a new restricted maritime zone outside Hormuz in the coming days, beginning at the line of the US naval blockade and extending into parts of the Gulf, Reuters reports, citing Iran’s Supreme National Security Council secretary Mohsen Rezaei. Any vessel entering the zone would be added to Iran’s sanctions list.

The restrictions land on an already-thinning route: An average of just 10 commodity vessels a day crossed Hormuz over the past 10 days — the lowest since May — after another round of US-Iran strikes on vessels. US forces struck three Iranian oil carriers over the weekend, while Tehran says it targeted three tankers using “unauthorized routes” through Hormuz — with data from Kpler showing Saturday’s crossings falling into the single digits.

The shipping lanes themselves could also be redrawn: Iran and Oman have agreed on coordinates for a new international corridor through their waters in the strait, under a joint framework giving Iran a management role. Tehran says it will only commit to keeping the strait open once US attacks and threats against Iran stop.

Why it matters: A formal restricted zone would give Iran a pretext to sanction — and potentially seize — vessels it deems non-compliant, on top of the strikes already thinning traffic. That raises the cost and risk calculus for every shipper deciding whether to run the strait at all, just as Qatar tests whether LNG exports through Hormuz are viable again.

Qatar plays against long odds: Six empty LNG carriers linked to Qatar are now in the Gulf of Oman or heading toward it, while another has already crossed the strait and is steaming toward Qatar, Bloomberg reports. The movements suggest QatarEnergy may be positioning vessels to resume exports through Hormuz, which were halted since an attack on one of its tankers in late July knocked out shipments representing almost a fifth of global LNG supply.

The real constraint is the tanker pool itself: QatarEnergy has continued loading the tankers it still has available inside the Gulf, keeping parts of Ras Laffan operating while sending some fuel to Kuwait. But 15 vessels are now sitting behind Hormuz carrying Qatari LNG, and another two are loading at Ras Laffan. More empty ships making it back through the strait would give the company room to keep cargoes moving — though two vessels that approached Hormuz in recent days ultimately turned back.

Qatar has already been experimenting with another way around the bottleneck. Qatar and the UAE recently moved three LNG cargoes through rare ship-to-ship transfers off Oman and the UAE’s east coast for delivery to India and Japan, part of a broader pattern of Gulf workarounds that includes Aramco and Adnoc’s own transfer points and shuttle systems. But LNG STS is harder to scale than the crude-oil version producers have used for years: unlike oil, LNG requires continuous cooling through the handoff, which limits it to compatible tankers and specialized equipment, alongside shipowners, crews, and insurers prepared to take the Gulf transit risk.