The two tankers and a container ship have been struck in the Gulf, as Iran pressed a campaign to disrupt global energy markets in retaliation for US and Israeli strikes.
Iran said it was behind one of the attacks, but did not comment on the others.
The first attack occurred roughly 50 kms from Iraq’s coast. Iraq’s State Organisation for Marketing of Oil (SOMO) said that two tankers are Maltese-flagged oil Zefyros and the Safesea Vishnu which was sailing under the Marshall Islands flag.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said Thursday they had struck the Marshall Islands-flagged ship Safesea, which they claimed was US-owned, in the north of the Gulf “after ignoring and not complying with warnings and alerts”.
Indian authorities earlier said the Safesea Vishnu was struck by a “white-coloured unmanned speed boat carrying explosives” which “rammed into it, resulting in a major fire onboard”. One person was killed and the rest of the crew were rescued.
The Iraqi government’s media cell told national news agency INA that “two tankers were subject to sabotage”.
The other attack saw a container ship “struck by unknown projectile causing a small fire onboard”, around 35 nautical miles off the coast of the UAE – close to the Strait of Hormuz. All the crew were reported as being safe.
Iraq’s oil ministry said on Thursday it had “deep concern” about incidents involving oil tankers in the Gulf.
“The safety of navigation in international maritime corridors and energy supply routes must remain free from regional conflicts,” the ministry added.
The Strait of Hormuz, the waterway carrying a fifth of the world’s oil, remains closed to almost all oil tankers, and Iran has vowed that not one litre of oil would be exported from the Gulf while its war with the United States and Israel continues.
The war “is creating the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market”, as Iran’s chokehold on regional supplies forces Gulf producers to slash production, the International Energy Agency said Thursday.
An IEA market report said crude oil production was currently down by at least 8.0 million barrels per day, with an additional 2.0 million of petroleum products shut off. Oil prices briefly rose back over $100 a barrel on Thursday.
The US Department of Energy said it will release 172 million barrels of oil from its strategic reserve as part of an agreement among IEA members to release 400 million barrels to ease market turbulence.
Oil-rich Iraq has long been a proxy battleground between the US and Iran, and saw itself dragged straight into the Middle East war after Israel and the US attacked Iran on February 28. Within hours, warplanes and missiles from every direction filled its airspace.
With AFP
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