Iran has clarified that its emerging maritime agreement with Oman will not, by itself, reopen the Strait of Hormuz to normal commercial shipping, insisting the United States must first meet a series of political and economic conditions. The clarification by Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi comes a day after Tehran announced it had agreed with Oman on the geographical route vessels would follow through the strategic waterway. In an interview with the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), Gharibabadi stressed that the Iran-Oman arrangement was only a framework for managing vessel movements and did not amount to a decision to restore unrestricted shipping.