US, UK navies say responded to call from ship in Strait of Hormuz
The US Navy said the merchant ship was “harassed” by Iranian Revolutionary Guards boats.
The US Navy has said its sailors and the British Royal Navy came to the aid of a ship in the crucial Strait of Hormuz after Iran’s Revolutionary Guards reportedly “harassed” it.
Three fast attack guard ships with armed troops on board approached the merchant ship closely on Sunday afternoon, the US Navy said in a statement.
It shared black-and-white footage, which showed three small ships close to the commercial vessel taken by a US Navy Boeing P-8 Poseidon flying overhead.
The United States Navy destroyer USS McFaul and the Royal Navy frigate HMS Lancaster responded to the incident, with the Lancaster launching a helicopter.
“The situation escalated about an hour later when the merchant ship confirmed that the fast attack craft had left the scene,” the navy said. “The merchant ship continued to pass through the Strait of Hormuz without further incident.”
About 20 percent of the world’s oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf.
Although the Navy did not identify the ship involved, ship tracking data from MarineTraffic.com, analyzed by The Associated Press, showed that the Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier Venture erratically veered course as it passed through the strait at the time of the incident .
The location also matched information about the incident from the UK Maritime Trade Operations, a British military operation that monitors traffic in the region. The ship also resembled the images released by the Navy.
The ship’s registered manager, Trust Bulkers of Athens, Greece, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Iran’s state media and Revolutionary Guards did not immediately acknowledge the incident. The Iranian mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
This latest incident comes after a string of maritime incidents involving Iran after the US unilaterally withdrew from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2018.
The US is suspected of seizing the Suez Rajan, a tanker linked to a US private equity firm believed to be carrying Iranian crude oil off the coast of Singapore.
Although authorities have not acknowledged the seizure of the Suez Rajan, the ship is now off the coast of Galveston, Texas, according to ship tracking data analyzed by the AP.
In late April, Iran seized the Turkish-operated Chinese tanker Advantage Sweet, which was carrying Kuwaiti crude oil for US energy company Chevron. Iran said the tanker had collided with an unknown Iranian ship hours before it was seized.
In early May, Iran seized the Niovi, a Panamanian-flagged tanker, as it left a dry dock in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, bound for Fujairah on the UAE’s east coast. While there was no cargo on board, data from S&P Global Market Intelligence seen by the AP showed that in July 2020, the Niovi received oil from a ship then known as the Oman Pride.
The US Treasury Department cleared the Oman Pride and others associated with the ship in August 2021 as being “involved in an international oil smuggling network” that supported the Quds Force, the Guard’s expeditionary force operating throughout the Middle East. East operates.