The capture of an Iranian container ship by marines of the United States of America near the Strait of Hormuz on early Monday has sent tensions between the warring nations into a fresh spiral, underscoring the fragility of the Pakistan-mediated efforts aimed at brokering peace. The US military claimed that the Iranian ship was trying to cross the Strait of Hormuz in violation of the blockade that American naval forces have enforced since April 13 on Iran-linked ships seeking passage through the narrow waterway. But Iran, which argues that the blockade is illegal, described the capture of the ship as an act of piracy. Incidentally, Tehran itself has been enforcing a toll booth of sorts at the Strait, allowing passage only to vessels from countries that have struck deals with it. But even those ships have no guarantees of safety, as two Indian tankers discovered last week, after they were fired upon despite receiving clearances from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Soon after the capture of the Iranian ship, Tehran announced that it had no plans of joining the Pakistan-mediated talks with the US scheduled to be held in Islamabad. Meanwhile, the US president, Donald Trump, has said that his negotiators are headed for the Pakistani capital, and that he is himself open to meeting the Iranian leadership if a deal is struck. While public postures in the middle of a war are often at variance with behind-the-scenes negotiations, even if direct Iran-US talks do resume in Pakistan soon, the recent escalations over the Strait of Hormuz underscore why uncertainty will continue to cloud any movement towards sustainable peace. On another front, Israel continues to violate its tenuous truce with Lebanon; the Iran-backed Hezbollah, too, targets Israeli troops occupying parts of southern Lebanon. Between the US and Iran, key sticking points — from Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile to the future of the Strait of Hormuz — remain unresolved. In the absence of a breakthrough on crucial issues, shortages in oil, gas, fertilisers, helium and other essential commodities are causing severe economic strains across the world. As they continue to play their high-stakes diplomatic poker, the US and Iran are, in essence, holding the whole world hostage.