|
2021-08-06 Syria-Lebanon-Iran
|
|
Crew of tanker off UAE coast said to thwart Iran hijacking by sabotaging engines
|
|
After action report. [IsraelTimes] Five or six button men seeking to divert Panama-flagged asphalt tanker to Islamic Theocratic Republic managed to flee after US and Omani warships arrived at scene; none of crew on board injured.
The crew of a Panama-flagged asphalt tanker off the coast of Oman reportedly managed to thwart an attempt by Iranian button men to take control of their ship and divert it to the Islamic Theocratic Republic .
Well done, guys! Five or six Iranian operatives stormed the Asphalt Princess on Tuesday, but the crew onboard quickly sprung to action and sabotaged the ship’s engines so that it could not move any further, UK officials told British daily The Times on Wednesday.
Continued from Page 1
The button men fled the ship once US and Omani warships arrived at the scene, The Times said, adding that none of the crew was injured in the hijacking attempt.
The incident — described by the British military’s United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations on Tuesday night as a "potential hijack" — revived fears of an escalation in Mideast waters and ended with as much mystery as it began.
Last Thursday, a Briton and a Romanian were killed in a drone attack on an Israeli-linked vessel, the Mercer Street, that the US, UK and Israel have blamed on Iran.
Hints of what unfolded Tuesday on the Asphalt Princess began to emerge with a maritime radio recording, obtained by commodities pricing firm Argus Media and shared with The News Agency that Dare Not be Named. In the audio, a crew member can be heard telling the Emirati coasties that five or six armed Iranians had boarded the tanker.
"Iranian people are onboard with ammunition," the crew member says. "We are... now, drifting. We cannot tell you exact our ETA to (get to) Sohar," the port in Oman listed on the vessel’s tracker as its destination. It was not clear whether the crew members, whom he identified as Indian and Indonesian, were in danger at the time.
Late on Tuesday, the intruders boarded the Asphalt Princess sailing off the coast of Fujairah, authorities said. The official news agency of Oman’s military said it received reports that the Asphalt Princess had been hijacked and immediately dispatched Royal Air Force maritime patrol aircraft and naval vessels "to contribute to securing international waters."
In the recorded radio traffic, when the Emirati coasties asks the crew member what the Iranian button men were doing onboard, he says he "cannot understand the [Iranians]," his voice muffled, before trying to hand over the radio to someone else. The call then cuts off.
Possible signs of trouble began to emerge that evening when six oil tankers off the coast of Fujairah announced around the same time via their Automatic Identification System trackers that they were "not under command," according to MarineTraffic.com. That typically means a vessel has lost power and can no longer steer.
Satellite-tracking data for the Asphalt Princess had showed it gradually heading toward Iranian waters off the port of Jask early Wednesday, according to MarineTraffic.com. Hours later, however, it stopped and changed course toward Oman, just before the British navy group declared the hijackers had departed and the vessel was now "safe."
In an analysis, maritime intelligence firm Dryad Global described the seizure of the Asphalt Princess as the latest Iranian response to outside pressures, economic conflicts and other grievances.
"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 spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
has consistently shown that in conducting this kind of operation, it is calculated in doing so, both by targeting vessels directly connected with ongoing disputes and [vessels] operating within the ’grey space’ of legitimacy," which may be involved in illicit trade, Dryad Global said.
The owner of the Asphalt Princess, listed as Emirati free zone-based Glory International, could not immediately be reached for comment.
The US military’s Mideast-based 5th Fleet and the British Defense Ministry also did not respond to requests for comment. The Emirati government did not immediately acknowledge the incident.
The Gulf of Oman sits near the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all traded oil passes. Fujairah, on the UAE’s eastern coast, is a main port in the region for ships to take on new oil cargo, pick up supplies or trade out crew.
For the past two years, after then-President Donald Trump
...Perhaps no man has ever had as much fun being president of the US...
withdrew the US from Iran’s nuclear deal and imposed crushing sanctions, the waters off Fujairah have witnessed a series of explosions and hijackings. The US Navy has blamed Iran for a series of limpet mine attacks on vessels that damaged tankers.
In the summer of 2019, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard troops detained a British-flagged tanker, the Stena Impero, near the Strait of Hormuz. Last year, an oil tanker sought by the U.S. for allegedly circumventing sanctions on Iran was hijacked off the Emirati coast and later ended up in Iran, though Tehran never acknowledged the incident.
And in January, armed Iranian Revolutionary Guard troops stormed a South Korean tanker and forced the ship to change course and travel to Iran. While Iran claimed it detained the ship over pollution concerns, it appeared to link the seizure to negotiations over billions of dollars in Iranian assets frozen in South Korean banks. 
|
Posted by trailing wife 2021-08-06 00:00||
||
Front Page|| [23 views ]
Top
File under: Govt of Iran
|
|
06:23 NN2N1
06:16 Procopius2k
06:14 Procopius2k
06:11 Procopius2k
06:08 NN2N1
05:14 NN2N1
04:45 Grom the Reflective
04:37 Grom the Reflective
04:34 Grom the Reflective
02:01 Angealing+B.+Hayes4677
01:34 Angealing+B.+Hayes4677
00:55 Besoeker
|
