By Steve Holland
WASHINGTON, May 5 (Reuters) - Ten civilian sailors have died due to the ongoing conflict in the Strait of Hormuz, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters on Tuesday.
Speaking at the White House, Rubio said the U.S. would continue to deploy its assets to defend freedom of navigation in the key thoroughfare.
"They're isolated, they're starving, they're vulnerable and at least 10 sailors have died as a result, civilian sailors," Rubio said, without providing additional details.
Rubio insisted the U.S. was taking defensive action in enforcing its blockade of Iranian ports. The initial military operation against Iran was over, he said.
"We are only responding if attacked first. This is a defensive operation," Rubio told a press conference. "If no shots are fired at these ships and no shots are fired at us, we're not firing shots, but if we're fired on we will respond."
Rubio said the United States has been in touch with a number of ships about moving out of the strait, echoing remarks made earlier by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
The United Arab Emirates said it was under attack from Iranian missiles and drones on Tuesday, even as Washington said a shaky ceasefire was intact.
Hegseth said hundreds of ships were lining up to pass through the critical waterway. Before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran on February 28, about 20% of global oil supplies passed through the strait daily.
Rubio said it was time for Tehran to "accept the reality of the situation", adding that U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were continuing to explore a diplomatic solution.
That solution had to address any nuclear material that Iran still had buried "deep somewhere," Rubio said.
"The president's been clear that part of the negotiation process has to be not just the enrichment, but what happens to this material that's buried deep somewhere that they still have access to if they ever wanted to dig it out," he said.
Rubio declined to provide details on what progress had been made and said the actual agreement would not need to be written out in one day.
"This is highly complex, and highly technical, but we have to have a diplomatic solution that is very clear about the topics that they are willing to negotiate on and the extent and the concessions they are willing to make at the front end in order to make those talks worthwhile," he said.
(Reporting by Steve Holland, Gram Slattery and Andrea Shalal; editing by Michelle Nichols and Alistair Bell)
