Indonesia Urges US and Iran to Uphold Peace Agreement Amid Hormuz Blockade

Jakarta (ANTARA) - Indonesia is urging the United States and Iran to continue to adhere to the peace memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in Islamabad last month and to immediately halt hostilities in the Strait of Hormuz. “There was an MoU yesterday, we hope that the document can continue to be respected by both sides,” said Foreign Minister Sugiono after a meeting of the 6th Indonesia-Vietnam Joint Commission on Bilateral Cooperation (JCBC) in Jakarta on Tuesday. Indonesia considers it crucial to stop the war and restore peace in the Gulf region, noting that the dynamics there will directly impact the lives of people in Indonesia. He stressed that Indonesia’s position in facing the dynamics of the US-Iran war remains unchanged in fighting for peace and restoring regional stability. “Our position has not changed. We want the situation there to stabilise again, for peace to be achieved, and for the attacks to stop immediately,” Sugiono said. Despite the peace agreement through the Islamabad Memorandum signed on 17 June, the US and Iran resumed mutual attacks starting 7 July following a dispute over commercial shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz. The United States has launched a series of offensive operations against several targets in Iran, while Tehran retaliated by attacking US assets at various points in the Gulf region. The latest attack was carried out by US Central Command (CENTCOM) on Monday, with the stated aim of degrading Iran’s ability to continue attacking international shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. On the same day, US President Donald Trump announced his administration was re-imposing a policy of ‘blockade on Iran’ and proposed charging a 20 percent fee on cargo transiting the Strait of Hormuz in exchange for US protection of the strategic waterway. “We are putting back in place the BLOCKADE on Iran, so named because it only stops ships or customers of Iran from entering or leaving. All other countries will have fair and open use of the Strait,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform. Trump stated the US would provide security guarantees in the waterway and charge cargo operators “20% of all cargo shipped.”