‘Hijacking’ of oil tanker off coast of UAE is over, says British military

The Navy has said the ‘incident [is] complete’ and ‘the vessel is safe’ (Pictures: Reuters)

The group of armed men who seized an oil tanker off the coast of the United Arab Emirates have now left the ship, the British Navy has said.

The military’s UK Maritime Trade Operations warned of a ‘potential hijack’ near the Emirati port of Fujairah in the Gulf of Oman on Tuesday night.

In an update, the agency said the ‘incident [is] complete’ and ‘the vessel is safe’, without providing any further details.

It remains unclear who was behind the attempted hijacking or what ship was being targeted.

The military’s UK Maritime Trade Operations warned of a ‘potential hijack’ near the Emirati port of Fujairah (Picture: AP)

The vessel was believed to be the Panama-flagged tanker Asphalt Princess.

Satellite-tracking data had showed it gradually heading toward Iranian waters off the port of Jask early Wednesday, according to MarineTraffic.com.

Later, however, it stopped and changed course toward Oman, just before the British navy group announced the intruders had left.

The incident took place in an area in the Arabian Sea leading to the Strait of Hormuz, the conduit for about a fifth of the world’s sea-borne oil exports.

Iran’s senior armed forces spokesman, Abolfazl Shekarchi, on Tuesday denounced reports of maritime incidents and hijacking in the Gulf area as ‘a kind of psychological warfare and setting the stage for new bouts of adventurism’.

The United States said it was too early to offer a judgment on reports of a maritime incident.

The incident comes days after an attack on the Mercer Street tanker which left a Briton and a Romanian dead (Picture: Reuters)

Tensions have simmered in the region after a suspected drone attack last week on an Israeli-managed tanker off the Omani coast killed two crew members and was blamed on Iran by the United States, Israel and Britain.

Iran denied responsibility.

The UK and US have said they would work with allies to respond to the attack on the Mercer Street, a Liberian-flagged, Japanese-owned petroleum product tanker.

Tehran has said it would respond to any threat against its security.

Regional tensions have worsened since 2018, when Washington re-imposed sanctions on Iran after abandoning a 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and global powers.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

For more stories like this, check our news page.

from News – Metro https://ift.tt/37gwlvy