Iran has moved its long-awaited answer to a U.S. war-ending proposal into the mediator channel, sending its response through Pakistan as talks shift from waiting on Tehran to testing what kind of ceasefire terms can actually reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran’s state news agency IRNA said Sunday that Tehran had sent its response to a U.S. proposal aimed at ending the more than two-month war to mediator Pakistan, according to Reuters reporting published by U.S. News & World Report. Al Jazeera also reported that Pakistan had confirmed receiving the Iranian response.
The content of the response has not been released in full. But IRNA, citing a source familiar with the matter, said Iran’s proposal would make the current phase of negotiations focus exclusively on ending hostilities. That makes the reply important even before Washington publicly reacts: it suggests Tehran is trying to put the immediate war and shipping crisis first, while pushing harder disputes into a later stage.
The reply shifts the crisis into a new diplomatic phase
Until now, the latest round of Iran crisis reporting was dominated by whether Tehran would answer at all. That changed Sunday. Al Jazeera’s Kamal Hyder reported from Islamabad that Pakistani officials had confirmed receipt of the response, adding that the next question is when Pakistan communicates it to the United States and how Washington reacts.
That distinction matters. A response sent to a mediator is not the same thing as a signed deal. CNBC reported that Michael Waltz, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said Sunday that the Trump administration had not yet received Iran’s answer directly. He also said negotiations were moving slowly because of the difficulty of reaching Iran’s leadership.
So the new phase is not “peace deal done.” It is more precise — and more fragile: Iran has now placed its answer into the diplomatic pipeline, and the first test is whether Pakistan can convert that into a set of terms Washington is willing to treat as serious.
Hormuz remains the core pressure point
The Strait of Hormuz sits at the center of the proposed sequencing. Reuters reported that sources in both camps said the latest peace effort is aimed at a temporary memorandum of understanding that would halt the war and allow traffic through Hormuz while a fuller deal is negotiated. That larger deal would still have to address harder disputes, including Iran’s nuclear program.
That framework explains why the response is bigger than a diplomatic paperwork update. Hormuz is not just one topic in the talks. It is the battlefield, the bargaining chip, and the economic pressure valve.
Before the war, the narrow waterway carried about one-fifth of the world’s oil supply. Since the fighting began, Iran has heavily restricted non-Iranian shipping through the strait while the United States has maintained pressure on Iranian vessels and ports. Any temporary deal that lets commercial traffic resume would be a major economic and military de-escalation, even if it leaves the nuclear file unresolved.
A Qatari LNG tanker crossed as the talks moved
The diplomatic movement came as a Qatari liquefied natural gas tanker, Al Kharaitiyat, crossed the Strait of Hormuz on Sunday, according to CNBC’s report citing shipping analytics firm Kpler. CNBC said it was the first Qatari LNG vessel to cross the strait since the U.S. and Israel began the war on February 28.
That crossing matters because Qatar and Pakistan have both been tied to mediation efforts. Reuters-linked reporting said the voyage had been approved by Iran as a confidence-building move with Qatar and Pakistan, offering some relief to Pakistan after gas import disruptions contributed to power blackouts.
Still, one crossing does not mean the strait is open. Iranian officials have also warned that vessels from countries following U.S. sanctions could face trouble crossing Hormuz, and regional drone incidents continue to keep the ceasefire under pressure.
What happens next
The immediate watch item is Washington’s response. If the United States accepts the mediator channel as a serious opening, the next step could be talks over a temporary memorandum that freezes hostilities and creates a managed path for commercial shipping through Hormuz.
If Washington rejects the response, or if Iran’s terms are seen as a delaying tactic, the crisis could snap back into the same dangerous pattern: tanker incidents, drone warnings, pressure on Gulf states, and renewed threats around the strait.
For now, the real development is narrow but significant. Tehran is no longer only delaying. Its answer is now with Pakistan. Whether that becomes a ceasefire framework or another failed proposal depends on what reaches Washington next.
Sources: Reuters via U.S. News & World Report, CNBC, Al Jazeera.