The naval forces of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on Thursday (local time) seized at least 15 crew members aboard two tankers accused of "fuel smuggling".
The names of the seized tankers, the flags they had been flying at the time, and the nationalities of its crew members have not yet been revealed.
The seizure of the tankers, which reportedly carried about one million litres of fuel—mostly diesel—between them, is the latest of its kind by Tehran's naval forces. The vessels were apprehended near Iran’s Farsi Island in the Persian Gulf and their crew members handed over to judicial custody, a Tasnim report said.
The IRGC has claimed that the tanker seizures—which came amid heightened naval tensions with the US and pressure to accept a nuclear deal—were because the vessels had been “engaged in smuggling operations for several months", the report noted.
"(The vessels) were identified and intercepted following surveillance, interception and intelligence operations,” it added.
Iran has some of the world's lowest fuel prices, owing to heavy subsidies.
This comes nearly two months after the IRGC seized the Aruban-flagged oil tanker MT Valiant Roar (IMO: 9190078). The December 8 seizure also saw the detention of the ship's 18 crew members, of which 16 were Indian.
Calls to recover the Indian crew members soon reached the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), which began negotiations with Iranian authorities in mid-December.
However, as of mid-January, those efforts have been in vain, as Iran has repeatedly denied India consular access to them.
New Delhi added that it had also established contact with Glory International FZ-LLC, the UAE-based firm that manages the MT Valiant Roar, as well as the Iran-based agents of the company and the Iranian Navy, urging them to provide the vessel's crew with food, water, fuel (for the ship), and adequate legal representation in court.
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