Iran seized an Emirati oil tanker travelling through the Strait of Hormuz, the first such attack on international shipping in months.
The Marshall Islands-flagged oil tanker Talara was sailing from Ajman, United Arab Emirates, to Singapore when it was intercepted. British maritime risk management group Vanguard and other maritime sources told Reuters that the vessel was seized by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. The private security firm Ambrey told the Associated Press that the hijacking involved three small Iranian boats.
Flight tracking data showed the United States deployed a high-altitude U.S. Navy MQ-4C Triton drone shortly after the hijacking.
The Cyprus-based Columbia Shipmanagement, responsible for the tanker, said in a statement that it had lost contact with the vessel.
The company said it “notified the relevant authorities and is working closely with all relevant parties — including maritime security agencies and the vessel owner — to restore contact with the vessel. … The safety of the crew remains our foremost priority,” the Associated Press reported.
The hijacking marks a sharp escalation in tensions, after they had largely died down following the 12 Day War between Israel and Iran, culminating in surgical U.S. strikes against Iranian nuclear targets. Iran had repeatedly threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz throughout the war, a move that could jeopardize the world economy.
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Roughly one-quarter of the world’s oil trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz, with oil giants Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Iraq, and Kuwait sending all or most of their oil through this route.
Iran has long leveraged harassment of oil shipping through the strait as key leverage in international negotiations, going back to the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1988. Iranian harassment of international oil shipping during the war triggered the U.S. Operation Praying Mantis, which obliterated the majority of the Iranian Navy.