State television broadcast footage overnight ​of masked troops pulling up in a grey speedboat alongside the MSC Francesca, climbing a rope ladder to a shell door in the hull and jumping through brandishing rifles.

The footage, presented with an action-movie-style ‌soundtrack and no commentary, also included views of another ship, the Epaminondas. Iran claimed to have captured both on Wednesday, accusing them of trying to cross the Strait without permits.

The vice speaker of parliament, Hamidreza Hajibabaei, said the first revenue from a toll that Iran was now collecting from ships using the strait had been transferred to the central bank’s account. He gave no further details about who had paid it, when or how much.

Iran’s judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei said the merchant vessels attacked in the strait had “faced the law”. Iranian speedboats and marine drones were sheltering ​in sea caves off an island near the mouth of the strait and keeping the U.S. Navy from approaching.

PAKISTAN STILL IN TOUCH WITH SIDES ABOUT TALKS

Iran, which has effectively blocked the strait to ships apart from its own ​since the United States and Israel launched the war in February, has been left in apparent control of the waterway since last-ditch peace talks were called off on Tuesday, hours ⁠before a two-week ceasefire expired.

Tehran says it will not consider opening the strait, normally the route for a fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas, until the US lifts a blockade of Iran’s own shipping, which Washington imposed during the ​ceasefire and Tehran calls a violation of that truce.

The US military has intercepted at least three Iranian-flagged tankers in Asian waters and is redirecting them away from their positions near India, Malaysia and Sri Lanka, shipping and security sources said on Wednesday.

US President ​Donald Trump cancelled threats to restart attacks on Iran in the ceasefire’s final hours on Tuesday, but has refused to lift the blockade. There has been no formal extension of the ceasefire, and no plans have been announced for further talks.

Iranians, who endured six weeks of US and Israeli bombardment before the ceasefire on April 8, described a nerve-wracking environment under the threat of renewed warfare.

“In a situation that is neither peace nor war, things are somewhat frightening. At every moment, you think that Israel or the US might launch an attack,” Arash, 35, a ​government employee in Tehran, told Reuters by phone. “You cannot make decisions about the future in such a situation.”

Pakistan, which hosted the only peace talks of the war earlier this month and had been preparing to host a second round before it ​was called off on Tuesday, was still in touch with both sides, a Pakistani government source said.

The Pakistani source said Iranian officials were still declining to commit to sending a delegation, citing the US blockade and other reasons.

“Yesterday, diplomats from various countries met different Pakistani ‌authorities and asked ⁠about the expected dates for the next round of talks, but they could not give them any timeframe, clearly,” the Pakistani source said.

Iran has said publicly it is willing to talk in principle, but that the US blockade and inconsistent demands from Washington made it impossible to commit. The US delegation, led by Vice President JD Vance, never left Washington.

“You did not achieve your goals through military aggression, and you will not achieve them by bullying either,” the head of Iran’s negotiating team, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf , wrote on social media on Wednesday. “The only way is recognising the Iranian people’s rights.”

The United States was separately due to host a second round of talks between Israel and Lebanon on Thursday, with Lebanon seeking an extension of a ​ceasefire reached last week in a war that has run ​in parallel to the Iran war.

Israeli strikes killed five ⁠people, including a journalist in Lebanon on Wednesday, the deadliest day there since the US-brokered truce took effect last week. Iran says maintaining the Lebanon ceasefire is a precondition for talks on the wider war.