The Strait of Hormuz was disrupted or nearly closed for roughly three and a half to four months, offering Gulf states aligned with the U.S. one clear message: energy flows - or tanker transits - must be rewired through pipeline networks that bypass the maritime chokepoint.
By creating alternative pipeline export routes through the UAE, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Syria, Oman, or Turkey, regional producers can reduce the risk that Tehran can once again use Hormuz as a leverage tool to disrupt tanker traffic through one of the world’s most critical maritime chokepoints.
TotalEnergies SE CEO Patrick Pouyanne is the latest to signal the urgent need for Gulf producers to prioritize building pipelines that bypass the Strait of Hormuz, according to Reuters.
Speaking at an energy conference in Paris on Tuesday, Pouyanne said, "The reality is that the Strait of Hormuz represents a genuine threat, so we must act. To ensure it doesn't remain a threat, there is only one solution: we must invest in pipelines to bypass the strait, which is an absolute priority."
Pouyanne identified alternative export routes in the UAE and Iraq, as well as through Syria. He continued, "When you are in Iraq and need to reach the sea, you can go down through Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, or head towards Syria or Turkey."
He referenced TotalEnergies' discovery of oil in Iraq in 1928, which led to an Iraq-Syria pipeline that took six years to build and allowed the French energy giant to load crude in the Mediterranean and feed refineries in southern France.
"If our predecessors did it 100 years ago, I believe we should be capable of doing it again today," he added.
Pouyanne's comments to bypass Hormuz come days after the UAE's Minister of Foreign Trade Thani Al Zeyoudi told Bloomberg in an interview that "zero Hormuz dependency" is essential for survival, adding, "It's going to open and we hope that will happen quickly, but we will not stop the new plan."
The plan includes major investments in pipelines, rail, and road links from UAE ports in the Persian Gulf to Dibba, Fujairah, Khor Fakkan and at least one new harbor on the Gulf of Oman coast.
Earlier this month, Sheikh Khaled Ahmad Al-Sabah, managing director of international marketing at Kuwait Petroleum, said Kuwait is among the countries that have reportedly held talks with Saudi Arabia and the UAE about potential cross-border pipelines that could connect Gulf oil production to buyers without relying on tanker transits through Hormuz.
In the first month of the conflict, Saudi Arabia's Hormuz-bypassing East-West pipeline ramped up to its full capacity of 7 million barrels a day, allowing the Kingdom to divert flows from Persian Gulf loading terminals to those at Yanbu on the Red Sea.
There is a growing consensus among Gulf producers and global energy giants that a pipeline network must be expanded at lightning speed to bypass the Hormuz chokepoint. That logic is simply because it would drastically reduce the region’s dependence on the chokepoint and simultaneously shatter Tehran’s ability to use tanker flows as a leverage tool in any future spat with Washington.
Related:
Earlier today, Eurasia Group senior analyst Gregory Brew wrote on X that Iran's regional leverage is eroding: "This may be Iran's first misstep—and proof that its leverage isn't total. Iran announced the strait was closed, but it didn't *close* the strait. Without the credible threat of force, Iran's sway over the waterway has limits."
Tyler Durden Tue, 06/23/2026 - 22:10Authored by Jack Phillips via The Epoch Times,
The Trump administration on June 23 proposed increasing the cost of becoming an American citizen in a move that would nearly double the price of naturalization.
The proposal would raise the government’s fee for filing an online naturalization application form, the N-400, from $710 to $1,280, an 80-percent increase, according to the proposal from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), published in the Federal Register on Tuesday.
For paper filings of the N-400, DHS said that it wants to raise the fee from $760 to $1,330, an increase of 75 percent.
For online filings of the N-336, a form requesting a hearing on naturalization proceedings, the fee would increase from $780 to $1,425, an 83 percent increase.
The paper filing fee for Form N-336 would rise from $830 to $1,475, a 77.7-percent increase.
“Although DHS has historically limited the fees for (citizenship-related applications) to fulfill previous administrations’ priorities of encouraging naturalization, DHS no longer believes naturalization benefit requests should get lower fees at the potential expense of other immigration benefits,” DHS said in its proposed regulation.
DHS officials also said they were moving to remove some fee waivers for poorer applicants. Those waivers would be given only to people who are trying to become citizens by joining the U.S. military, it said.
Should the proposal be accepted, according to the agency, the increases in fees would bring in more than $430 million each year from prospective citizens. It added that around 1 million people seek to become naturalized citizens each year.
The decision drew some pushback from the American Immigration Council. Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a fellow with the group, said in a post on X that he believes the DHS proposal is targeting people who have green cards, or permanent residency status, from becoming American citizens.
“The U.S. government for years tried to keep the costs artificially low to encourage more people with green cards to apply for citizenship,” he wrote. “No more, it seems!”
DHS will be accepting public comments until Aug. 24, 2026.
Since taking office, President Donald Trump’s administration has tightened rules around legal immigration and naturalization. In May, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) said it would require immigrants seeking green cards to apply from their home country.
“We’re returning to the original intent of the law to ensure aliens navigate our nation’s immigration system properly,” USCIS spokesman Zach Kahler said in a statement last month.
“This policy allows our immigration system to function as the law intended instead of incentivizing loopholes. When aliens apply from their home country, it reduces the need to find and remove those who decide to slip into the shadows and remain in the U.S. illegally after being denied residency.”
Weeks before that, DHS said that immigrants who have made statements that it deems extremist would face closer scrutiny from immigration officials, with a spokesperson saying that such comments “may raise serious concerns for USCIS personnel reviewing an applicant’s file, including espousing terrorist ideologies, expressing hatred for American values, advocating for the violent overthrow of the United States government, or providing material support to terrorist organizations.”
Tyler Durden Tue, 06/23/2026 - 21:45