The UK, Australia and Japan said on Monday that they have no plans to deploy naval or maritime forces to help secure the Strait of Hormuz, after Donald Trump urged a group of allied nations to support the United States in protecting the strategic waterway.
With the ongoing conflict involving the US, Israel and Iran entering its third week and unsettling the Middle East while rattling global energy markets, Trump said on Sunday that countries heavily dependent on Gulf oil should help safeguard the route through which roughly 20% of the world’s energy supplies pass.
Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s prime minister, said her country has no plans to send naval vessels to escort ships in the region. She said that Japan’s war-renouncing constitution limits such deployments, despite the country importing around 95% of its oil from the Middle East.
Australia, another key Indo-Pacific security partner of the US and also reliant on fuels produced from Middle Eastern crude, similarly said it would not dispatch naval ships to help reopen the strait.
Meanwhile, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer reportedly told Trump that Britain is not prepared to deploy Royal Navy destroyers to the blockaded waterway.
The disruption in global energy markets caused by the Iran conflict has also drawn criticism from climate officials, with the UN’s climate chief warning that the crisis highlights the risks of continued reliance on fossil fuels.
