French President Emmanuel Macron pressed President Donald Trump on Tuesday to bring the conflict over the Strait of Hormuz to a swift end.
Macron declined to blame the president directly for the global energy pandemonium caused by the Iran war’s impact on the Strait of Hormuz, but suggested during an ABC News interview that Washington “probably underestimated” Iran’s move to use the water passageway as a political pawn. The “Iranian regime discovered they had this card in their hands,” in its ability to lock down the Strait of Hormuz when the war started, Macron noted, as around 20% of the world’s commercial oil and gas trade normally passes through the waterway.
“I will not here blame anybody. We are where we are,” Macron said. “I think the U.S — I mean, your country — is the one able to fix this issue, and we need you. We have to fix this issue.”
While he called the Iran war a “mistake,” Macron said he has a “very good” relationship with Trump, and though they sometimes disagree, “we have always been extremely frank to each other.” When pressed on whether he would authorize the French military to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, Macron said Paris is “prepared to be more engaged.”
“I don’t want to engage in a confrontation with any country, but we are ready to be more engaged in order to protect some capacities in order to make this transit possible, yes,” he said.
Macron’s remarks followed his announcement Tuesday that France and the United States are taking joint action to further freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz. He offered little detail in a post to X, but said the move was designed to reduce tensions on energy markets while protecting critical infrastructure in the Middle East.”
The development came the same day Macron met with Trump in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.
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Macron hailed a “constructive” discussion and a “willingness to reopen Hormuz,” revealing afterward that “several solutions were discussed … which would make it possible, without a comprehensive deal, to find ways and means of allowing more container ships and tankers to go through” the Strait of Hormuz.
France has started drafting a U.N. Security Council resolution in coordination with the U.S. on setting up an international mission to restore movement in the Strait of Hormuz, diplomats told the Straits Times.