On Wednesday, December 24, naval forces of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) detained an oil tanker in the Persian Gulf. There were 16 foreign crew members on board the ship, Iranian state television reported, citing the commander of the IRGC’s 1st Naval Zone, General Abbas Gholamshahi.
The IRGC says the ship was detained in Iranian territorial waters and was carrying 4 million liters of smuggled fuel taken from small vessels.
Iranian media do not report what flag the ship was flying under.
This is the second such operation carried out by the IRGC since early December. Earlier this month, Iranian authorities seized a tanker carrying 6 million liters of smuggled diesel in the Gulf of Oman, carrying 18 crew members from India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.