140725-N-FC670-869 PACIFIC OCEAN (July 25, 2014) The guided-missile destroyer USS Michael Murphy (DDG 112) (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Shannon Renfroe/Released)
WASHINGTON, April 11 (Reuters) – The U.S. military said on Saturday that it had started “setting conditions” for clearing mines in the Strait of Hormuz, with two U.S. warships passing through the key waterway.
In a post on X, the U.S. Central Command said the USS Frank Peterson and USS Michael Murphy transited the Strait of Hormuz “as part of a broader mission to ensure the strait is fully clear of sea mines previously laid by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps.”
“Today, we began the process of establishing a new passage and we will share this safe pathway with the maritime industry soon to encourage the free flow of commerce,” Admiral Brad Cooper, the head of Central Command, said in a statement.
Earlier on Saturday, U.S. President Donald Trump posted on social media that the United States military has started to clear the Strait of Hormuz, and that all of Iran’s minelaying ships have been sunk.
“We’re now starting the process of clearing out the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post, adding that “all 28” of Iran’s “mine dropper boats are also lying at the bottom of the sea.”
Trump has repeatedly said that American forces have destroyed Iran’s navy and air force while crippling its ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
But fear of Iranian attacks on shipping over the past several weeks has effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz, a critical conduit for global oil supplies. Throttling the strait has disrupted global energy markets.
U.S. gasoline prices have spiked even though most of the oil that flows through the waterway does not go to the United States.
Representatives from the U.S. and Iran began talks hosted by Pakistan in Islamabad on Saturday amid a fragile ceasefire in the conflict.
(Reporting by Idrees Ali and Jason Lange; Editing by Jan Harvey, Sergio Non and Alistair Bell)
(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2026.
Updated: April 12, 2026 (Originally published April 11, 2026)
This article contains reporting from Reuters, published under license.
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By Suban Abdulla and William Schomberg LONDON, April 11 (Reuters) – Britain’s government said on Saturday it had put on hold its deal to cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands – home...
A small number of merchant vessels have begun edging back through the Strait of Hormuz, offering the first visible signs of movement after weeks of disruption. But far from signalling recovery, these carefully managed transits are exposing a deeper and more unsettling shift: one of the world’s most critical shipping lanes is no longer operating under normal commercial rules.
The Trump administration has doubled its maritime insurance backstop to $40 billion, expanding a flagship effort to restart commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz—even as shipowners continue to largely stay away.
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