Before the war with Iran, the rules governing navigation in the Strait of Hormuz were clear. But the conflict has changed much.
With the effective closure of the passage by Iran, and U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement last Tuesday of a two-week suspension of military strikes against Tehran, along with his call for the “full, immediate and safe reopening of the strait,” the dispute is no longer about who controls the waterway, but whether the rules of international navigation themselves still hold.
About 4.5% of global trade and one-fifth of global oil and gas trade pass through the strait. Yet the Strait of Hormuz is not merely a strategic corridor; it is a hidden global infrastructure: undersea internet cables, oil and gas supply lines, and commercial arteries linking the Gulf to Asia and Europe.
Economic researcher Adel Sabri told Alhurra that disruptions to traffic in this corridor could prevent shipments from reaching global markets altogether.
Since 1982, the strait has been governed by a stable legal regime under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which established the principle of “transit passage”: absolute freedom of navigation through international straits without restrictions or fees, even in times of tension.
This principle does not grant littoral states the right to control transit but obliges them to ensure its continuity.
James Kraska, a professor of maritime law at the U.S. Naval War College, said that freedom of passage through international straits is absolute and cannot be obstructed or conditioned by any party. Any disruption, he told Alhurra, constitutes a clear violation of international law, entailing an obligation to cease the violation and provide compensation.
In recent weeks, signs of actual disruption to navigation have emerged, without an official declaration of closure but with a clear shift in the behavior of ships and shipping companies.
Sabri described the situation as an undeclared closure that nonetheless exists in effect, noting that the threat alone is sufficient to disrupt navigation. According to data from Reuters and S&P Global, about 200 vessels were stranded near Gulf shores in early March 2026, including around 40 oil tankers inside the strait. Although the numbers later declined, shipping companies have begun reassessing routes, delaying voyages or changing destinations entirely.
Amid the escalation, a regional proposal has emerged to apply a model similar to the Suez Canal to the Strait of Hormuz, effectively transforming it from an open passage into a managed facility with transit fees. However, the legal distinction between the two cases is fundamental.
Sabri explained that the Suez Canal is an artificial waterway located entirely within Egyptian sovereignty, granting Egypt the right to manage it and impose fees. By contrast, the Strait of Hormuz is a natural international passage not subject to the sovereignty of any single state and therefore cannot legally be priced.
Kraska added that littoral states of international straits do not have the authority to impose transit fees, as the right of transit passage is guaranteed to all states under international law.
The issue extends beyond Hormuz.
If this legal norm is broken, experts say the impact could spread to other straits worldwide, such as the Strait of Malacca, which links the Indian Ocean to the South China Sea and is managed through international cooperation aimed at facilitating navigation.
In this context, Sabri warned that imposing fees on ships transiting Hormuz would give other countries justification to demand similar measures in their own straits. This could open the door to fees in Gibraltar, the repricing of Malacca and similar models in Bab el-Mandeb, effectively transforming global trade arteries from an open system into a network of paid checkpoints.
Three parties are now clashing over Hormuz: Washington, which seeks to keep the passage open as it was; Iran, which aims to impose transit fees; and Gulf states, which are monitoring the situation after being significantly affected by the strait’s closure.
Hormuz is no longer merely a testing ground for balances of power. It has become a test of the international system’s ability to endure.
The article is a translation of the original Arabic.
Houda Elboukili
Houda Elboukili, an award-winning Moroccan investigative journalist based in the United States, holds a master’s degree in journalism and Institutional Media from the Higher Institute of Information and Communication in Rabat and a bachelor’s degree in economics from Cadi Ayyad University in Marrakesh.
