Gunmen reportedly boarded and seized the Greek-owned tanker St. Nikolas, which is sailing in the Gulf of Oman, reports the Associated Press.
The Associated Press reported the seizure of the Greek-owned tanker St.Nikolas, which sails under the flag of the Marshall Islands, by armed men in the Gulf of Oman.
A Greek man, registered as a probationary master born in 2004, is on board the ship. Actions will be taken for the Greek sailor by the Ministry of Shipping and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Details remained unclear in what was apparently the latest seizure of a vessel in the tense Middle East waterways. However, suspicion immediately fell on Iran as the ship was once known as the Suez Rajan and had been involved in a yearlong dispute that ultimately saw the U.S. Justice Department seize 1 million barrels of Iranian crude oil on it.
The apparent seizure also comes after weeks of attacks by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels on shipping in the Red Sea, including their largest barrage ever of drones and missiles launched late Tuesday.
That has raised the risk of possible retaliatory strikes by U.S.-led forces now patrolling the vital waterway, especially after a United Nations Security Council vote on Wednesday condemning the Houthis and as American and British officials warned of potential consequences over the attacks.
The Houthis say their attacks are aimed at halting the suffering of Palestinians in Israel’s war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. However, the rebels have increasingly targeted ships with tenuous or no ties to Israel.
Meanwhile, satellite tracking data analyzed by the AP on Thursday showed that an Iranian cargo vessel suspected of being a spying platform in the Red Sea had left the waterway. The data showed the Behshad had transited through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait into the Gulf of Aden.
The Behshad has been in the Red Sea since 2021 off Eritrea’s Dahlak archipelago. It arrived there after Iran removed the Saviz, another suspected spy base in the Red Sea that had suffered damage in an attack that analysts attributed to Israel amid a wider shadow war of ship attacks in the region.
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