This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
The British Navy on August 4 said hijackers who boarded a ship off the coast of the United Arab Emirates in the Gulf of Oman have left the vessel, without elaborating.
The notice came after the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations had warned of a “potential hijack” under unclear circumstances under way the night before. The group reported that the “incident [is] complete.” It did not provide further details.
Shipping authority Lloyd’s List and maritime intelligence firm Dryad Global had both identified the seized vessel as a Panama-flagged asphalt tanker called the Asphalt Princess.
It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the attempted hijacking, which came amid heightened tensions between Iran and the West and just days after the United States, Britain, and Israel blamed Tehran for a deadly drone attack on an oil tanker in the region.
Three maritime security sources told Reuters on August 3 that the Asphalt Princess had been seized by suspected Iranian-backed forces.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) denied that its forces or allies were behind any incident off the U.A.E. coast.
Any incident is an attempt by Western countries and Israel “to prepare the public opinion of the international community for hostile action” against Iran, the IRGC said in a statement run on state media on August 3.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzade also called the claims of a possible hijacking “completely suspicious.”
The latest event unfolded amid heightened tensions between Iran and the West over Tehran’s troubled nuclear deal with world powers and as commercial shipping in the Gulf region has found itself caught in the crosshairs.
Tehran has drawn criticism and warnings from NATO and the European Union after it was blamed by the United States, Britain, and Israel for a drone attack on an oil tanker off the coast of Oman that killed two crew members — a Briton and a Romanian. Iran has denied involvement in that incident, too.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, echoing comments from Britain, said on August 2 that there would be a collective response to the attack on the oil tanker.
Tehran said it would respond swiftly to any threat to its security.
