| Follow up to this and this from yesterday. Videos can be seen at the link. |
Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneouslytaking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet
militiasto extend the regime's influence. The word
Iranis a cognate form of
Aryan,the abbreviation
IRGCis a cognate form of
Stürmabteilung (or SA),the term
Supreme Guideis a cognate form of either
Shahor
Führeror maybe both, and they hate
on Thursday released a video showing a United Arab Emirates-based oil tanker that vanished in Iranian waters over the weekend, hours after admitting its Revolutionary Guard had seized a foreign vessel and its crew of 12 for smuggling fuel out of the country.
Iranian TV released footage of the ship surrounded by Guard vessels and showed the registration number painted on its bridge, matching that of the UAE-based MT Riah.
The Panamanian-flagged tanker stopped transmitting its location early Sunday near Qeshm Island, according to data on the tracking site Maritime Traffic.
However,
it's easy to be generous with someone else's money...
it often did so over the past two years when nearing Iranian waters, other tracking data shows.
US Central Command, which oversees American military operations in the Middle East, declined to comment.
Iran earlier said the tanker was seized south of its Larak Island in the Strait of Hormuz. Neighboring Qeshm Island has a Revolutionary Guard base on it.
Iranian state television
... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
did not at first identify the seized vessel but said it was intercepted on Sunday and was involved in smuggling some 1 million liters (264,000 gallons) of Iranian fuel. Iran did not identify the nationalities of the crew.
The announcement solved one mystery ‐ the fate of the missing ship ‐ but raised a host of other questions and heightened worries about the free flow of traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most critical petroleum shipping routes. One-fifth of global crude exports passes through the strait.
Crude prices, which had been falling since last week, ticked higher almost immediately after the announcement.
It was not immediately clear whether the seizure was a straightforward attempt by Iran to curb oil smuggling or also an effort to assert its authority in the strait and send a message to its rivals in the region. The UAE has long lobbied for tougher US policy toward Iran, though more recently it has called for deescalation.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said that the seized vessel was at best a "small tanker" and that Iranian forces are cracking down on fuel smuggling daily.
"We live in a very dangerous environment. The United States has pushed itself and the rest of the world into probably the brink of an abyss," he told news hounds at the United Nations
...a formerly good idea gone bad...
in New York. Zarif accused the Trump administration of "trying to starve our people" and "deplete our treasury" through sanctions.
Iranian media reported earlier this month that some 8 million liters of government-subsidized Iranian fuel are smuggled daily through Iran’s borders to other countries where prices are much higher.
Analysts at the Israeli-based maritime risk analytics company Windward said that the Riah has been at sea for the past two years and has a pattern of turning off its location transmitters for days at a time, particularly when entering Iranian waters.
The firm said data suggests that for more than two years that the 58-meter (190-foot) Riah had been clandestinely receiving fuel from an unknown source off the UAE coast and delivering it to other tankers, which then take it to Yemen
...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of...
and Somalia.
No distress calls were made from the Riah, and no ship owner reported a missing vessel.
The ship’s registered owner, Dubai-based Prime Tankers LLC, told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named it had sold the vessel to another company, Mouj al-Bahar. A man who answered a telephone number registered to the company told the AP it didn’t own any ships.
Officials in the UAE said the ship was neither UAE-owned nor operated and carried no Emirati personnel.
US State Department spokesperson says Iran must immediately release the vessel reportedly seized in the gulf and its crew
[TWITTER]
Breaking: US State Department spokesperson says Iran must immediately release the vessel reportedly seized in the gulf and its crew.https://t.co/5ii1VKYUQr pic.twitter.com/QqOwLNctIY
— Al Arabiya English (@AlArabiya_Eng) July 18, 2019
Trump calls on other countries to condemn what he says are Iran’s attempts to disrupt freedom of navigation and global commerce
[TWITTER]
Update: President Trump calls on other countries to condemn what he says are Iran’s attempts to disrupt the freedom of navigation and global commerce in the strategic waterway in the Gulf region.https://t.co/2lEAF2mi5X pic.twitter.com/HiFjWhWCw3
— Al Arabiya English (@AlArabiya_Eng) July 18, 2019