Chinese box ship crosses the Strait of Hormuz amid deadlocked negotiations

A small, Chinese-operated container liner is one of the few vessels to have sailed through the Strait of Hormuz in the past 24 hours, while the reopening of the route is being held up by deadlocked negotiations between the US and Iran, Reuters reports. Before the war against Iran began on February 28, an average of 125–140 ships sailed through the strait daily, but in recent days, according to Reuters’ analysis of ship-tracking data, that number has fallen to about ten vessels a day, with crude oil tankers accounting for only a small portion. According to Reuters, around 20,000 seafarers are stranded aboard hundreds of ships in the Persian Gulf while a US blockade of Iranian ports and Iran’s control of the strait are making the Pakistan-mediated peace talks more complex. “We need the waterways to open; that’s for sure, both for the shipping industry and, no less importantly, for the global economy. In the meantime, it’s more of the same in the market,” shipbroker Fearnleys explains, according to Reuters.