U.S. Navy F/A-18 Super Hornets, assigned to the Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group, fly a mission over the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, April 8, 2025. (Staff Sgt. Jackson Manske)
U.S. and Iranian negotiators have reached a tentative agreement to extend the ceasefire by 60 days and launch talks on Iran’s nuclear program, according to a U.S. official familiar with the matter.
The official, who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said President Donald Trump still needs to sign off on the emerging memorandum of understanding.
Iran did not immediately confirm any tentative deal with the United States.
The memorandum of understanding would state that shipping through the vital Strait of Hormuz would be “unrestricted,” Axios reported. Iran would have to remove all mines from the strait within 30 days, according to the news outlet.
The news followed overnight clashes between the U.S. and Iran, with both sides accusing the other of breaching the ceasefire that started in early April.
The U.S. military on Wednesday intercepted five Iranian one-way attack drones that “posed a clear threat in and near the Strait of Hormuz,” U.S. Central Command said in a statement on X.
U.S. forces also struck a ground control station in the port city of Bandar Abbas that was about to launch a drone, CENTCOM told Stars and Stripes in an earlier email.
“These actions were measured, purely defensive, and intended to maintain the ceasefire,” said the statement, which was attributed to a U.S. official.
State-controlled Iranian news outlet IRIB acknowledged the strikes on Bandar Abbas and said Tehran had retaliated by attacking the U.S. base where the strikes originated. No damage has been reported to U.S. bases in the region.
The U.S. attacks were carried out by F/A-18, F-16 and F-35 jet fighters, according to The Wall Street Journal.
It is the second outbreak of U.S.-Iran violence this week.
On Monday, the U.S. struck Iranian missile sites and boats attempting to lay mines, another action officials said was done in self-defense.
The ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran reached in April has been punctuated by intermittent fire as both sides struggle to find common ground on top-line issues, including the Iranian nuclear program and control of the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran has repeatedly attacked commercial ships in the strait, a vital artery for oil-bearing ships. The U.S. has imposed its own blockade on Iranian ports as part of an effort to pressure Iran to make concessions.
U.S. forces briefly escorted commercial ships through the strait under a mission called Project Freedom but stopped earlier this month after only one day, reportedly amid regional concerns that the effort could lead to the unraveling of the ceasefire. U.S. Central Command this week denied reports suggesting it had resumed ship escorts.
Iranian missiles and drones continue to target ships in the strait and have occasionally targeted infrastructure in neighboring countries during the ceasefire.
Earlier this month, the United Arab Emirates said a drone struck near a nuclear power station. Early Thursday, Kuwaiti officials said they were intercepting more air attacks.
In its X statement Thursday, Central Command said Iran committed an “egregious ceasefire violation” by launching a ballistic missile, which Kuwaiti forces intercepted.
On Wednesday, Trump asserted that no one nation would control the Hormuz waterway, which has emerged as one of the key obstacles in resolving the conflict. The effective closure of the strait since the start of the war in late February has strangled about a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas supplies, leading to a surge in prices and rising inflation, Bloomberg reported.
“It’s international waters,” Trump said during a cabinet meeting. “The strait’s going to be open to everybody” and the U.S. will “watch over it.”
Trump didn’t indicate what steps the U.S. might take to ensure the free transit of vessels. The U.S. Treasury said it took action against Iran’s Persian Gulf Strait Authority, accusing it of launching a new attempt “to monetize its campaign of state-sponsored terror by extorting vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz.”
Iran has expanded its claimed jurisdiction and set out new rules for vessels seeking to transit the waterway. That involves seafarers dealing with the new Iranian agency and sometimes getting payment requests of as much as $2 million for safe passage.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said 26 commercial ships and oil tankers have transited the waterway in the past 24 hours after obtaining permission, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported, citing an IRGC statement. Vessels attempting unauthorized entry into the Persian Gulf were stopped by Iran’s naval forces, it said, Bloomberg reported.
