German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said he has told his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi in a phone call that Tehran must reopen the Strait of Hormuz to international shipping and abandon its nuclear weapons program." “I emphasised that Germany supports a negotiated solution,” Wadephul said in a post on X about the call. “As a close US ally, we share the same goal: Iran must completely and verifiably renounce nuclear weapons and immediately open the Strait of Hormuz, as also demanded by” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Iran virtually closed off the strait — a vital waterway for the transport of oil, gas and fertilizer — after the US and Israel launched attacks on it on February 28 and has so far not reopened it despite the current ceasefire, causing economic disruption across the globe. However, it denies wanting to produce nuclear weapons and says its uranium enrichment activities, which are viewed with suspicion by many Western countries, are for civilian purposes only.