European Union grants US request to restrict satellite images of Iran War region

The European Union has agreed to delay satellite imagery of critical Persian Gulf shipping routes by twenty-four hours in response to a request from the US government. Per Ars Technica, the restriction applies to images captured by Europe's Copernicus program, specifically photos of the Strait of Hormuz taken by the Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 satellites. The delay was authorized by the EU Council on July 13, though the original US request came in May during a ceasefire in the ongoing US-Iran conflict. That ceasefire lasted from April 8 until July 8, when the Trump administration announced it would resume military strikes, and the satellite imagery restriction is now taking effect alongside that escalation.

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