Iran seized two ships in the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, tightening its grip on the strategic waterway, after US President Donald Trump called off attacks indefinitely with no sign of peace talks restarting.
Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency said the Revolutionary Guards had seized two vessels for maritime violations and escorted them to Iranian shores. It was the first time Iran has seized ships since the beginning of the war at the end of February.
Earlier, a British maritime security agency reported three ships had come under fire.
The US breach of commitments and its blockade of Iranian ports and threats are the main obstacles to "genuine negotiations", Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Wednesday.
'World sees your endless hypocritical rhetoric and contradiction between claims and actions," he said, one day after US President Donald Trump's ceasefire extension.
Iran's parliament speaker and top negotiator Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf said on Wednesday that a complete ceasefire only made sense if it was not violated by the US blockade of Iranian ports.
Qalibaf said in a post on X that the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz was impossible with such a "flagrant breach of the ceasefire".
US President Donald Trump has not set a timeline for the extension of a ceasefire with Iran, a source briefed on the matter said on Wednesday.
Trump said in a statement on social media late on Tuesday that the US had agreed to a request by Pakistani mediators "to hold our Attack on the Country of Iran until such time as their leaders and representatives can come up with a unified proposal ... and discussions are concluded, one way or the other."
But even as he announced what appeared to be a unilateral ceasefire extension, Trump also said he would continue the US Navy's blockade of Iran's trade by sea. The United States fired on and seized an Iranian cargo vessel on Saturday and boarded a huge Iranian oil tanker on Tuesday in the Indian Ocean.
Iran considers the US blockade an act of war and has said it will not lift its closure of the strait, which has caused a global energy crisis, as long as the US blockade continues.
Pakistan still working to foster talks despite setback
Pakistan, which has acted as a mediator, was still trying to bring the warring sides together for negotiations after both failed to show up for last-ditch talks on Tuesday before the two-week-old ceasefire was due to expire.
A luxury hotel in Islamabad had been cleared out for the talks, but Iran never publicly accepted the invitation and the US delegation led by Vice President JD Vance never left Washington. The hotel was still shut on Wednesday but a wider security perimeter had been loosened.
"We had prepared everything. We were all prepared for the talks, the stage was set," a Pakistani official briefed on the preparations told Reuters. "If you ask me honestly, it was a setback we were not expecting, because the Iranians never refused, they were up to come and join and they still are."
Another Pakistani source who was involved in the talks said Pakistan was still "working very hard to bridge that conflict, talk to each side with their sensitives in mind".
"We will know later on when they can come. Things change so often it's hard to speak on what's to come," the source said.
There was no response early on Wednesday to Trump's ceasefire announcement from senior Iranian officials, although some initial reactions from Tehran suggested Trump's comments were being treated skeptically.
Tasnim said Iran had not asked for a ceasefire extension and repeated threats to break the U.S. blockade by force.
An adviser to Iran's lead negotiator, the speaker of parliament Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, said Trump's announcement might be a ploy.
Just hours before Trump called off attacks, he had repeated threats to resume them, declaring that his military was "raring to go".
Container ship reported damaged by Iranian fire
Throughout the war, Iran has effectively shut the strait to ships other than its own by attacking vessels that attempt to transit without its permission. Around a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas normally passes through the waterway. On Wednesday, Britain's maritime security agency UKMTO said that at least three container ships had reported being hit by gunfire in the strait.
The master of one ship reported being approached by an Iranian gunboat northeast of Oman on Wednesday, the agency said. The vessel came under fire from guns and rocket-propelled grenades and its bridge was heavily damaged, although there were no reports of casualties or environmental damage.
Two other ships had said they came under fire about eight nautical miles west of Iran with no reported injuries.
Iran has condemned the US Navy intercepting Iranian ships at sea as part of its blockade, including a huge tanker bound for Singapore that was boarded in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday hours before peace talks had been due to resume. Iran's foreign ministry accused the US of "piracy at sea and state terrorism."
Differences remain on key issues
With his announcement on Tuesday, Trump again pulled back at the last moment from warnings to bomb Iran's power plants and bridges, a threat condemned by the United Nations and others as potentially constituting war crimes. Iran had said it would strike its Arab neighbours if its civilian infrastructure was hit.
U.S. stock futures rose, the dollar wavered and oil prices fell below $100 on Wednesday following the ceasefire announcement, even as the tentatively scheduled peace talks in Islamabad seemed on the verge of falling apart.
Before Trump's latest announcement, a senior Iranian official had told Reuters that Iran's negotiators had been willing to attend another round of talks, but only if the U.S. abandoned a policy of pressure and threats.
A first session of talks 11 days ago produced no agreement, with the United States focusing on a longstanding dispute over Iran's stockpiles of highly enriched uranium. Trump wants to take it out of Iran to prevent Tehran from enriching it further to the point where it could be used to make a nuclear weapon.
Iran says it has only a peaceful civilian nuclear programme and a sovereign right to continue it as a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It wants the war to end, sanctions to be lifted, reparations for wartime damage and recognition of its control over the strait.