UK Rejects Trump Hormuz Blockade Plan, Starmer Says

April 13, 2026

Summary

Starmer said Britain would not support Trump’s planned U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz.

Why this matters

The Strait of Hormuz is a critical route for global energy shipments, so allied divisions over how to respond to the Iran conflict carry economic and security implications. The split also highlights strains in U.S.-UK coordination on military and diplomatic strategy.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said Monday that the UK would not support President Donald Trump’s proposed U.S. blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, underscoring another policy difference between the two governments over Iran.

“We’re not supporting the blockade,” Starmer told BBC Radio 5 Live. He said Britain’s diplomatic, political, and military efforts were “focused from our point of view on getting the straits fully open.”

The British government said Sunday that it continued to call for freedom of navigation and the reopening of the strait after Trump announced that the U.S. would begin a naval blockade of the waterway, a key route for global energy supplies.

“Effective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump posted on Truth Social on Sunday. “Any Iranian who fires at us, or at peaceful vessels, will be BLOWN TO HELL.”

In an interview on Fox News, Trump said he understood that “the UK and a couple of other countries are sending minesweepers.”

The UK has discussed deploying autonomous mine-hunting drones in the strait if allies agree on a viable plan to reopen it. Starmer had previously said those systems were “in the region.” That proposal is separate from Trump’s blockade plan.

On Monday, Starmer declined to discuss “operational matters,” but acknowledged the UK’s mine-sweeping capability while outlining British efforts to reopen the strait.

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Europe

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According to Hungary’s National Election Office, with more than 95% of votes counted, Tisza was set to win 138 of 199 seats, compared with 55 for Fidesz and six for Mi Hazank Mozgalom. Earlier provisional counts also showed Tisza leading, with 53.74% of the vote to 37.65% for Fidesz with more than 90% counted.

Addressing supporters in Budapest, Magyar said Tisza had won a mandate to govern. “We have done it, Tisza and Hungary have won this election,” he said. “In the history of democratic Hungary, this many people have never voted before, and no single party has ever received such a strong mandate as Tisza.”

He later added: “We did it … Together, we brought down the Orban regime — together. We liberated Hungary; we took back our homeland.”

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Middle East

Report: Iran executions rose to 1,639 in 2025

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Iranian authorities executed at least 1,639 people in 2025, the highest annual total reported since 1989, two nongovernmental groups said Monday.

The total was up 68% from 975 executions in 2024, according to a joint annual report by Norway-based Iran Human Rights and Paris-based Together Against the Death Penalty. The groups said the figure, based on cases confirmed by at least two sources, was an “absolute minimum” because most executions were not reported in Iranian state media.

The report said the total amounted to more than four executions a day and was the highest since Iran Human Rights began tracking executions in 2008.

It warned that if the Islamic Republic “survives the current crisis, there is a serious risk that executions will be used even more extensively as a tool of oppression and repression.”

The groups also said “hundreds of detained protesters remain at risk of death sentences and execution” after being charged with capital offenses tied to January 2026 protests. Those demonstrations were suppressed in a crackdown that rights groups said left thousands dead and tens of thousands arrested.

Iran executed seven people in connection with the January protests during the war with Israel and the United States that began Feb. 28: six convicted of membership in the banned opposition group People’s Mujahedin of Iran, and one dual Iranian-Swedish citizen charged with spying for Israel.

Nearly half of those executed were convicted of drug-related offenses. At least 48 women were executed, up 55% from 31 in 2024 and the highest number recorded in more than 20 years. Of those, 21 were executed for killing husbands or fiancés, and rights groups said such cases often involved abusive relationships.

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Finance & Markets

Gold Falls as Hormuz Blockade Plan Lifts Inflation Risk

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Gold fell Monday as higher energy prices added to inflation concerns after U.S.-Iran talks ended without a deal and Washington said it would begin blockading the Strait of Hormuz.

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Dozens of people were killed in airstrikes in Nigeria’s northeastern Yobe state on Saturday, according to local residents and Amnesty International, as military aircraft targeted Islamist militants.

The strikes hit Jilli village, with casualty estimates varying by source. Amnesty International said on X that there were “more than 100 dead” and 35 people seriously wounded.

“We have their pictures and they include children,” Isa Sanusi, Amnesty International’s Nigeria director, told The Associated Press. “We are in touch with people that are there, we spoke with the hospital. We spoke with the person in charge of casualties, and we spoke with the victims.”

Local chief Lawan Zanna Nur said “the total casualties, dead and injured, is around 200.” He said many victims were taken to hospitals in nearby Geidam and Maiduguri, where at least eight more of the wounded died Sunday.

“We are talking of dozens dead but it is difficult to give a specific toll,” he said.

A market committee member, Bulama Mulima Abbas, told AFP that “36 bodies have been counted” after the airstrike “on the traders.”

Nigeria’s military said it struck a location in Jilli “long identified as a major terrorist movement corridor and convergence point for Islamic State West Africa Province terrorists and their collaborators.” It described the attack as “a carefully, well coordinated planned and intelligence-driven operation” and said it “successfully conducted a precision air strike on a known terrorist enclave and logistics hub located near the abandoned village of Jilli.”

The military said “scores of terrorists” were killed, but did not mention civilian casualties. The Nigerian Air Force later said it had activated its Civilian Harm Accident and Investigation Cell “to immediately proceed to the location on a fact-finding mission on the allegation.”

An intelligence source told AFP that Jilli market “is wholly controlled by Boko Haram who provides security and collect tax from traders.”

Nigeria has fought a jihadist insurgency since Boko Haram’s 2009 uprising. The conflict, which later included the Islamic State West Africa Province, has killed more than 40,000 people and displaced about 2 million, according to the United Nations.
Africa

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Pope Leo XIV will visit Algeria from April 13 to 15, becoming the first pope to travel to the country.

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Archbishop Jean-Paul Vesco, the French-born cardinal of Algiers, said he invited Leo on May 8, the day of his election and the feast day commemorating Algeria’s 19 martyrs, priests and nuns killed during the civil war.

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Hawaii lawmakers are advancing a bill to reduce the number of state inmates held at a private prison in Arizona, where about 800 Hawaii prisoners are housed.

House Bill 1769 began as a proposal requiring the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to cut its out-of-state prison population by 25% by July 1, 2029, and by another 50% by July 1, 2031. After House and Senate revisions, the measure now calls for reductions of 5% by July 1, 2027, 10% a year later, and 15% the following year.

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Hawaii

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House Bill 1950, introduced by Rep. Adrian Tam, D-Waikiki, would have directed part of the state’s transient accommodations tax to tourism marketing and destination management. The bill passed the House and the Senate Committee on Economic Development and Tourism, but Senate Ways and Means Chair Donovan Dela Cruz, D-Mililani-Wahiawa-Whitmore Village, did not schedule a hearing.

Dela Cruz said HTA already receives recurring support through the general fund, which preserves legislative oversight and flexibility during emergencies, including COVID-19, wildfires, floods, and volcanic activity. He also said lawmakers were still assessing HTA’s direction and performance as it operates under governance changes approved last year.

HTA was created in 1998 and long received a share of transient accommodations tax revenue. It now relies on general fund appropriations. The agency received $63 million for fiscal 2026 and is seeking $66 million for 2027, including funding for sports tourism.

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Military & National Security

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The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency plans to store millions of gallons of ship and aircraft fuel in the southern Philippines, according to U.S. and Philippine officials.

A March 31 solicitation from the agency outlined plans for a fuel storage facility in or near Davao on Mindanao. Starting in April 2028, the contractor would provide 41 million gallons of storage capacity, including 23 million gallons of naval fuel and 18 million gallons of aviation fuel.

The contract would cover 24-hour receiving, storing, protecting, testing, and shipping of U.S. government-owned fuel, according to the notice.

Commercial fuel is already stored at Subic Bay, the former U.S. naval base on Luzon. A Mindanao facility would give U.S. forces another refueling point in the region in addition to Subic Bay and Manila.

Rear Adm. George Bresnihan, commander of the Defense Logistics Agency’s energy division, visited fuel storage sites in Australia and Papua New Guinea in September, according to a Nov. 24 agency news release.

“DLA Energy exists to provide America’s warfighters with timely and reliable access to fuel,” he said in the release. “Maintaining a decentralized network of fuel support points enables our team to deliver global energy solutions for sustained operational readiness.”

Rear Adm. Roy Vincent Trinidad, a Philippine military spokesman, told reporters Friday at Camp Aguinaldo in Quezon City that the proposed Mindanao site would remain under Manila’s ownership and control.

The project is covered by existing agreements, including the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, which grants U.S. forces access to nine sites in the Philippines, he said, according to a report published Friday in the Manila Bulletin.

“These will still be Philippine facilities, Philippine-controlled facilities,” he said. “They are designed to support our response capability for [humanitarian assistance and disaster response], maritime security and support, and sustain our forces deployed, not only in the West Philippine Sea, but even in the southern border.”