Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Baghaei says a possible agreement with Oman on a new shipping route through the Strait of Hormuz will not, by itself, mean the strategic waterway will reopen, Press TV reports

Statements of this kind fit a familiar pattern in Hormuz episodes: technical or logistical arrangements on routing are floated while the political conditions for full transit remain unresolved, and officials are careful to decouple the two so a partial step is not read as de-escalation. Historically the waterway's status has moved on the security track rather than the administrative one, and routing agreements with third-party states have tended to function as diplomatic signalling rather than operational change. The mechanism that matters for pricing is freight, insurance and war-risk premia on Gulf loadings, which respond to the perceived probability of disruption rather than to formal reopening language; headlines of this type have tended to trim those premia only briefly when the caveat is this explicit. The actors here are consistent with prior form: Iranian spokespeople have historically kept sovereignty and security framing to the fore precisely when talks are live, retaining optionality. What is worth watching is whether the Oman track produces anything verifiable on the ground, such as escorted transits or revised insurer guidance, and whether other parties to the talks echo or contradict the framing. As it stands this is a tempering headline, not a resolution.