At the high-profile Posidonia shipping conference held in Athens this Tuesday, a leading figure in global shipping has thrown the global maritime community into debate with an unexpected stance on a contentious Middle East waterway issue. Evangelos Marinakis, a Greek shipping tycoon whose fleet of more than 150 vessels spans oil tankers, LNG carriers and bulk carriers, and who also owns prominent European football clubs Nottingham Forest and Olympiacos, says he is willing to pay a transit toll to Iran to keep the strategically critical Strait of Hormuz open. The $100,000 to $200,000 per-vessel fee, scaled to a ship’s size and cargo volume, is a far better outcome than facing disruptive delays and security risks, he argued, adding that the collected funds could help Iran offset damage it has suffered from ongoing US-Israeli military action against the country.
Marinakis’ position immediately puts him at sharp odds with major global and domestic political actors, including the Trump administration and his own home country’s government. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis made the country’s official stance clear in a May interview with the Financial Times, stating that Iran has no right to impose any form of toll on transit through the strait. The split among Greece’s most powerful shipping leaders further highlights deep divisions over how to handle the escalating crisis in the strategic waterway: just days after Marinakis’ remarks, fellow Greek billionaire shipowner George Procopiou pushed back against the idea of an Iranian toll at the same Posidonia forum, invoking Greek maritime tradition of breaking blockades to defend his opposition. Procopiou’s firm Dynacom has been one of the rare shipping operators continuing to send vessels through the strait amid ongoing regional conflict, reaping the benefits of skyrocketing freight rates driven by security risk premiums.
This debate comes as Iran has formally pushed to secure the right to charge transit tolls as part of any potential negotiated end to the current regional conflict, and has already moved to build diplomatic support from Oman, the only other state that shares territorial waters over the Strait of Hormuz. Geographically and legally, the situation is uniquely complex: at its narrowest point, the strait measures just 21 nautical miles across, while international law under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) allows coastal nations to claim territorial water rights up to 12 nautical miles. UNCLOS explicitly prohibits states bordering international straits from restricting transit or charging tolls for passage through their territorial waters in such key global waterways. However, legal experts interviewed by Middle East Eye note that Iran could still structure charges under alternative labels such as compulsory piloting fees or administrative service fees if Oman agrees to cooperate, creating a legal workaround for the policy. Multiple industry sources have already confirmed that some vessel operators have quietly paid unofficial transit fees to Iran in Chinese yuan in recent months.
With Greek shipping families controlling roughly 20% of the world’s total merchant fleet, the split among the country’s top industry leaders carries major implications for global energy trade and supply chain stability. Nearly 20% of the world’s daily oil consumption and a large share of global LNG trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz, making any disruption or new transit cost a shock that would ripple through global energy and commodity markets. The U.S. government has already issued a firm rejection of any Iranian attempt to impose transit charges, leaving shipping operators caught between conflicting legal, political and commercial pressures as they navigate one of the world’s most strategically critical waterways.