FILE - Cargo ships in the Strait of Hormuz. AFP
Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and the Netherlands said last week they were ready "to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz". A further 24 countries then endorsed this statement.
The "expectation is that there will be a further meeting, military-to-military, the chiefs of defence staff of the wider group that has now signed ... later this week," the official told AFP.
The chief of the defence staff of Britain's armed forces, Richard Knighton, chaired a meeting of the initial six countries plus Canada on Sunday, The Times reported.
"We recognise that we have a role to play in bringing together this coalition and helping to lead the rest of the world to develop a plan to ensure that we can reopen the Strait of Hormuz as quickly as possible," the official said.
The Times said the UK has offered to host a later summit in the southern naval port of Portsmouth or London to hammer out details and build the coalition, to ensure the waterway could be reopened "as soon as the conditions are right".
Iran has virtually blocked the vital strait to "ennemies related vessels", since the US-Israeli started the war on February 28, causing global oil and gas prices to soar.
Iran Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has multiple times said the "Strait of Hormuz is not closed to shipping traffic."
“Ships hesitate because insurers fear the war of choice you initiated—not Iran,” he explained.
“The Strait of Hormuz is not generally closed, but only to the US and its allies, and we will continue this policy as long as the attacks continue,” he added.
Tankers from India, China, Pakistan and Japan have been already allowed safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz.
A fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas passes through the strait in peacetime.
Iran on Wednesday said "non-hostile vessels" can transit the Strait of Hormuz if they meet safety and security regulations, according to a statement released to the International Maritime Organization (IMO).
The statement shared on Tuesday by the IMO stressed that "vessels, equipment and any assets belonging to the aggressor parties, namely the United States and the Israeli regime, as well as other participants in the aggression, do not qualify for innocent or non-hostile passage".
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