Iran seized a merchant ship in international Gulf waters on Thursday, the US Navy said, saying the day before that it had prevented Iranian forces from seizing two oil tankers off Oman. Iranian authorities did not immediately react to the US allegations on Thursday.
“The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (the ideological army of the Islamic Republic) seized by force a merchant ship probably involved in smuggling activities and transiting through the Gulf (…) in international waters”, indicated in a statement the US 5th Fleet, based in Bahrain.
Few details on the situation
After monitoring the situation “closely,” the U.S. Navy determined that the “circumstances of this incident did not warrant greater intervention,” the statement said. The 5th fleet does not give details on the exact location of the incident, on the flag of the boat and does not say either if it is still in Iranian hands.
On Wednesday, US Naval Forces Central Command (Navcent) said the USS McFaul responded to a distress call from the Richmond Voyager, which Iranian forces opened fire on several times without causing any casualties.
Imbroglio the day before
Iran justified Thursday its intervention the day before, saying that its forces had tried to intercept an oil tanker which it accuses of having collided with an Iranian vessel in the Gulf of Oman.
The Navcent also announced that it opposed on Wednesday the seizure by Iran of another tanker, the TRF Moss, flying the flag of the Marshall Islands, in the international waters of the Gulf of Oman. Iran made no reference to the vessel on Thursday. The Iranian press release also makes no mention of an intervention by the American Navy which, according to its command, led to the departure of the Iranian vessel.
More and more incidents
Incidents have increased in the waters of the Gulf, a maritime zone crucial for the global transport of oil, since in 2018 the United States withdrew from the international agreement intended to limit the Iranian nuclear program, reimposing sanctions on the Islamic Republic targeting in particular its oil sector.
The Iranian army had seized a tanker flying the flag of the Marshall Islands bound for the United States in late April in the Gulf of Oman, before seizing a tanker flying the flag of Panama transiting through the Strait of Hormuz a week later. The United States regularly criticizes Tehran’s actions in this maritime zone.