The supposed detention comes amid an increasingly escalating situation in the Persian Gulf, as the United States has been lobbying its allies to start patrolling the area to increase the security of their vessels in the face of what it has called the “Iranian threat”. Tehran, for its part, has repeatedly stated that it can guarantee the security of the Gulf region on its own.
Iranian coast guards have seized a ship purportedly carrying nearly 284,000 litres of smuggled diesel in the Persian Gulf and detained its 12 Filipino crew members, ISNA news agency reported.
Over the past three months, Iran has detained three commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic waterway linking Middle East crude oil producers to key world markets, over alleged maritime violations.
The best-known of these instances happened on 19 July, when the IRGC seized a British-flagged oil tanker, the Stena Impero, accusing it of violating maritime rules, ignoring warnings from the military, turning off its positioning device, and colliding with an Iranian fishing boat. At the time, Tehran clarified that the detention hadn't been made in retaliation for the detention of the Iranian-flagged Grace-1 oil supertanker by Gibraltar's authorities, assisted by UK Royal Marines, earlier that month.
Iran has also detained a Panama-flagged tanker and what is believed to be an Iraqi tanker for allegedly smuggling Iranian fuel to foreign customers….
