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The European Union will bring together its foreign ministers and Gulf counterparts next Monday, July 13, to discuss support for the U.S.-Iran agreement and ways to safeguard freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Wednesday.
The meeting comes as fresh military exchanges between Washington and Tehran raise new doubts over efforts to end the conflict. Kallas warned that the latest escalation could further undermine an already fragile peace process.
"The exchanges of fire between the U.S. and Iran further complicate already fraught talks to end the war. Iran's attacks on Bahrain and Kuwait are unacceptable," she wrote on social media platform X.
Kallas also accused Iran of violating its commitment under the June 17 memorandum of understanding to reopen the Strait of Hormuz after attacks on ships near the strategic waterway, warning that the incidents threaten the resumption of global energy supplies.
The agreement, brokered to halt the conflict, calls for the reopening of the strait to commercial shipping and launches a 60-day process toward a broader peace deal. Kallas stressed that freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea must be preserved.
She stressed that freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea must remain protected under the memorandum of understanding on June 17 aimed at ending the military conflict that began in late February.
Earlier on Wednesday, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced it had launched missiles and drones against 85 U.S. military sites, including Salman Port, home to the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain, and Ali Al-Salem Air Base in Kuwait.
The United States responded with a new wave of strikes on more than 80 targets inside Iran. U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said the operation was carried out "in immediate response to Iranian attacks on commercial vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz."
Speaking alongside NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte before the alliance's summit in Ankara, U.S. President Donald Trump declared the memorandum was "over." He nevertheless indicated that U.S. negotiators could continue contacts with Iranian officials despite describing the talks as "waste of time."
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