The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, has claimed Iran has agreed to negotiate aspects of its nuclear programme that it had refused to discuss even a month ago, even as Tehran announced it was halting peace talks and moving to fully close the Strait of Hormuz.
Appearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for the first time since the Trump administration launched its war against Iran in February, Rubio repeated claims that a deal was within reach. His testimony came a day after Iran's state-affiliated Tasnim News Agency reported that Tehran would stop exchanging messages with Washington through intermediaries, citing Israel's military operations in Lebanon as a ceasefire violation. Donald Trump later insisted that conversations had "been going on continuously".
Rubio told senators that "there is the prospect before us" for a deal, and claimed Mojtaba Khamenei – who succeeded his father after the supreme leader was killed in US-Israeli strikes on 28 February – was alive and increasingly engaged. On the military front, Rubio asserted that Iran's missile programme had been "substantially degraded", its launcher capacity reduced and its drone-building capability "eroded", though he conceded Iran still possessed "a lot of drones". The New York Times has reported that Iran retained roughly 70% of its prewar missile stockpile, though more than 85% of its ballistic missile, drone and naval defence industrial base has been damaged or destroyed.
Rubio outlined a two-phase framework. Reopening the Strait of Hormuz – with Iran announcing it was not charging tolls, helping remove mines and committing not to fire on ships – was a precondition for talks, not a bargaining chip. The second phase would require Iran to dispose of its stockpile of highly enriched uranium and negotiate "severe and long-term limitations, and or cancellation of enrichment activity".
Rubio ruled out offering sanctions relief simply to reopen the vital waterway, saying any relief was condition-based and tied to Iran's nuclear programme. The April ceasefire had included an Iranian commitment to reopen the strait, but Trump said Iran had "knowingly failed" to honour that pledge, prompting a US counter-blockade on 13 April targeting ships seeking to reach Iranian ports. Rubio said the blockade was costing Tehran "hundreds of millions of dollars a day" in lost oil revenue.
