Iran captured an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, the Fars agency said on the night of this Friday, December 12, adding that on board There were 18 crew members from India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
“An oil tanker carrying six million liters of smuggled diesel was boarded off the coast of the Sea of Oman”wrote the Iranian media, citing an official from the province of Hormozgan, in the south of the country.
“The ship had disabled all its navigation systems,” he said.
Iranian forces regularly announce the capture of ships that transport fuel in the Gulf illegally.
The price of fuel in Iran is one of the lowest in the world, which makes traffic to other countries even more profitable.
Iran had already captured an oil tanker in Gulf waters in November “for transporting unauthorized cargo,” ruling out that it was a retaliatory measure against another country.
The latest capture occurs in a tense geopolitical context, two days after the United States seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela.
According to Washington, the “Skipper” was transporting oil from Venezuela and Iran.
In 2022 he was sanctioned by the US Treasury for his alleged ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Hezbollah.
On the other hand, the Government of Iran called the boarding by the United States of the oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela “state piracy,” before emphasizing that it is “a clear case of armed robbery at sea”, amid bilateral tensions and the threat from US President Donald Trump on Maduro.
The spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, Esmaeil Baqaei, said that this act represents “a flagrant violation” of International Law and has stated that it represents a show of “contempt” for global maritime security, as reported by the Iranian Mehr news agency.
Likewise, he has stressed that domestic laws or sanctions imposed by the United States “do not alter the illegal and criminal nature of this fact” and has warned against “the continuation of this coercive behaviorwhich poses serious risks to international peace, security and global trade.”
With information from AFP and Europa Press*
