Iran seizes oil tanker in Gulf of Oman

According to a Reuters report, Iran has seized a tanker with Iraqi crude destined for Turkey on Thursday in retaliation for the confiscation last year of the same vessel and its oil by the United States.

The seizure of the Marshall Islands-flagged St Nikolas coincides with weeks of attacks by Yemen's Houthi militias targeting Red Sea shipping routes.

"After the theft of Iranian oil by the United States last year, St Nikolas tanker was seized by Iran's Navy this morning with a judicial order ... it is en route to Iranian ports," the semi-official Fars news agency reported, citing a statement by the Navy.

The St Nikolas, was seized by the United States last year in a sanctions enforcement operation when it sailed under a different name, Suez Rajan. Following the move, Iran warned the United States that it would "not go unanswered".

The St Nikolas was boarded by armed intruders as it sailed close to the Omani city of Sohar, according to British maritime security firm Ambrey, and its AIS tracking system was turned off as it headed in the direction of the Iranian port of Bandar-e-Jask.

The ship loaded 145,000 metric tons of oil in the Iraqi port of Basra and was heading to Aliaga in western Turkey via the Suez Canal, its operator Empire Navigation told Reuters, adding that it had lost contact with the vessel.

While Yemen's Houthis have since October last year attacked commercial vessels in the Red Sea to show support for Palestinian militant group Hamas in its fight against Israel, those incidents have been concentrated on the Bab al-Mandab Strait, to the southwest of the Arabian Peninsula.

Thursday's incident is located closer to the Strait of Hormuz, between Oman and Iran.

The vessel is manned by a crew of 19 including 18 Filipino nationals and one Greek national, the operator said, adding it was chartered by Turkish oil refiner Tupras.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) authority said earlier on Thursday it had received a report that a vessel located around 50 nautical miles east of Oman's coast was boarded by four to five armed persons.

The armed intruders were reported to be wearing military-style black uniforms and black masks.

The UK authority, which provides maritime security information, said it was unable to make further contact with the vessel and authorities were still investigating the incident.

The United States Navy's Fifth Fleet did not immediately respond to a request for comment or further information.

The Suez Rajan was carrying more than 980,000 barrels of Iranian crude oil last year when it was seized and the oil confiscated in the US sanctions enforcement operation.

The United States said at the time that Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had been trying to send contraband Iranian oil to China, in violation of US sanctions.

The vessel was unable to unload the Iranian crude for nearly two and half months over fears of secondary sanctions on vessels used to unload it. It was renamed the St Nikolas after unloading the cargoes.

 

Iran seizes third tanker

According to Seatrade Maritime News, Iran has detained a third tanker within 19 days, as the confrontation over the control of maritime assets in the Persian Gulf heats up.

"An Iranian oil tanker, which was seized by a foreign company five years ago, has been returned to the Islamic country in an operation by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC)," reports news agency IRNA.

On Saturday, the Tehran Times cited reports from Iranian news agency Tasnim to say that the 10,000-ton oil tanker Purity had returned to Iranian territorial waters as a result of a court order and a joint operation by the IRGC Navy and Intelligence Ministry, according to Mojtaba Qahremani, head of the justice department in Iran’s southern province of Hormozgan.

“The seized 10,000-ton oil tanker Purity had been illegally leased to a foreigner by falsifying documents since 2018 and its Iranian owners were deprived of the benefits of the oil tanker,” Qahremani was quoted as saying.

In contrast to earlier seizures by Iran, which appeared to have been limited to disputes over the cargoes on board vessels, the Islamic Republic implied the capture of the Purity involved the restitution of Iranian property to its rightful owners.

"The US Department of Defense will be making a series of moves to bolster our defensive posture in the Arabian Gulf," White House spokesperson John Kirby told a news briefing on Friday, according to Reuters.

In the past two years, Iran has harassed, attacked or interfered with the navigational rights of 15 internationally flagged commercial vessels, US officials were quoted as saying.

“Following a judicial order and close cooperation between the IRGC Navy and Intelligence Ministry, the oil tanker was finally identified and confiscated in the Persian Gulf waters earlier this month,” Qahremani added.

The Tehran Times said the ship docked in Iran’s Assaluyeh Port on the Persian Gulf’s westernmost coast to have its fuel consignments unloaded.

Late in October 2022, forces from the IRGC’s first naval zone captured a foreign tanker ship carrying 11 million gallons of illegal fuel in the Persian Gulf, the publication said. “The Islamic Republic has said unequivocally that the Persian Gulf would never be a safe haven for smugglers.”

In 1986, a series of missile and other attacks on Gulf-bound tanker shipping led to a surge in insurance rates for tanker owners, and the creation of a new bunkering hub in Fujairah, as the UAE cashed in on the agglomeration of shipping at anchor outside the Strait of Hormuz in order to avoid the conflict.

 

Suez Canal to hike transit tolls

Tolls for vessels using the Suez Canal are set to rise by 15% next year (2023) with the exception of dry cargo and cruise ships which will increase by 10%.

The transit toll increases from January 2023 were announced at the weekend by Adm. Ossama Rabiee, Chairman and Managing Director of the Suez Canal Authority (SCA).

According to the SCA the increases are based on a number of pillars, the most important of which is average freight rates for various times of vessels.

“In this regard, there were considerable and consecutive increases within the past period; especially in container ships' freight rates, compared to those recorded before the Covid-19 pandemic which will be reflected in the high operational profits that will be achieved by navigational lines throughout 2023 in light of the continued impact of the disturbances in global supply chains and the congestion in ports world-wide, as well as the fact that shipping lines have secured long-term shipping contracts at very high rates,” said Adm Rabiee.

The much-improved performance of the tanker market was also noted by the SCA with daily crude tanker charter rates up 88% compared to average rates in 2021, average daily rates for LNG carriers increasing by 11% compared to the previous year.

Tolls for all vessel types including tankers and container ships will increase by 15%. The only exceptions are dry bulk ships, where charter rates are currently extremely low and cruise ships, a sector still recovering from an almost total shutdown during the pandemic.

It comes at a time when ship operators already face rising fuel costs. However, the increased savings made on higher fuel costs by using the shorter route through the Suez Canal was used in part to justify the toll increases.

The Suez Canal offers a significantly shorter route between Asia and Europe with the alternative involving sailing round the Cape of Good Hope.

When the Suez Canal was blocked by the grounded containership Ever Given in March 2021 analysts Sea Intelligence estimated on the basis of vessels sailing at 17 knots transiting via the Cape of Good Hope would add seven days to a Singapore to Rotterdam voyage, 10 days to West Mediterranean, a little over two weeks to East Mediterranean and between 2.5 – 4.5 days to the US East Coast.

Adm Rabiee also noted that the increases are inevitable given current global inflation of over 8% and increasing operational and navigational costs for the Suez Canal.

“It was emphasized as well that the SCA adopts a number of mechanisms with the sole aim of having its pricing policies cope with the changes in the maritime transport market and to ensure that the Canal remains the most efficient and least costly route compared to alternative routes,” the Authority said.

These take the form of rebates of up to 75% for specific sectors of shipping for defined periods if market conditions result in the canal becoming less competitive.

 

Iran thwarts attempt by United States to detain an oil tanker

In a major act of defiance, Iran announced Wednesday that it had foiled a US attempt to confiscate Iranian oil in the Sea of Oman, setting the stage for further Iranian defensive acts to protect its oil exports in the face of growing threats from the US to restrict Iran’s oil trade. 

The naval forces of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) have launched a daring operation to protect Iran’s oil export after American forces confiscated a giant Iranian oil tanker in the Sea of Oman and transshipped its oil shipment to another oil tanker, the Iranian state media said on Wednesday. 

According to Iran’s state-run TV, the IRGC navy forces conducted a heliborne operation to return the seized oil cargo to Iran. The IRGC troops landed onboard the oil tanker carrying the seized oil and led it into Iran’s territorial waters. 

In the meantime, US forces sent several helicopters and destroyers in a bid to retake the oil tanker but the IRGC navy prevented them from doing so, according to Iranian media. 

The US made another effort to prevent Iran from taking the oil tanker but failed. 

The oil tanker is now in Iran’s territorial waters. Iranian media offered no further detail as to when the encounter happened and which country the seized oil tanker belongs to. 

The IRGC media office confirmed the encounter in a statement on Wednesday and said the oil tanker has docked at a Bandar Abbas port. The statement described the US move as “robbery.”

The United States has remained silent on Iran’s announcement. Of course, a US military official to Al-Jazeera, “The allegations of the Revolutionary Guard Corps about the Iranian oil tanker are not true.”

But the IRGC said it had “clear, telling, and undeniable images of the encounter” that would be shared with mass media. 

The episode marked the first time Iran and the U.S. engaged in a tense encounter since Joe Biden took office nearly a year ago. It also came against a backdrop of heightened tensions between Iran and the West over when to resume the stalled Vienna nuclear talks on how to revive a 2015 nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

On October 27, Iran said the Vienna talks will begin before the end of November. It also said on Monday the exact date for resuming the talks will be announced this week. 

While Iran’s return to Vienna remains under consideration, Washington and allies in Europe and the region ramped up their pressures on Iran both diplomatically and now economically. 

On the other hand, Iran called on the US to provide “objective guarantees” that Washington won’t renege on its commitments under a revived nuclear deal with Iran again.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh described US administrations as “rogue regimes” that are not reliable to work with. 

“Onus is on @POTUS to convince int'l community—incl all JCPOA participants—that his signature means something. For that, ‘objective guarantees’ needed. No one would accept anything less,” Khatibzadeh said on Twitter. 

But it seems that the US has refrained from offering such guarantees. The secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Shamkhani, likened the current state of play between Iran and the US to the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. 

“The attacks from Saddam were in progress / the sanctions continue. Part of Iran was under the enemy’s occupation / the Iranian nation’s economy has been held hostage. The combatants were defending (Iran) in the front line / The scientists proceed with the legal nuclear activities,” he said on Twitter. 

Just as Saddam Hussein when he offered to hold negotiations with Iran, Shamkhani continued, President Biden too, is not repentant for his policy on Iran. And he is not willing to offer guarantees, the top Iranian security official added. 

“In case the current situation does not change, the result of negotiations would be clear in advance,” he warned. 

Shamkhani’s remarks, along with reports of a hike in Iran’s oil exports in recent months that seem to be the main reason behind the latest encounter, were the latest sign that the resumption of negotiations between Iran and the West won’t affect Iran’s active resistance policy adopted after former US President Donald Trump launched his “maximum pressure” campaign against Tehran.