Britain calls UN tanker seizure 'illegal interference'
(VOVWORLD) - A top British representative to the United Nations has declared in a letter to the Security Council that Iran's seizure of a British-flagged tanker amounted to "illegal interference," in a rejection of Tehran's version of events.
UK-flagged oil tanker Stena Impero crossed the waters of Rotterdam, the Netherlands on April 3, 2018. (Photo: AFP/ VNA)
|
Iranian authorities impounded the Stena Impero with 23 crew members aboard after patrol boats from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps seized it on Friday in the highly sensitive Strait of Hormuz. Iranian officials said the tanker had turned off its transponder after hitting an Iranian fishing boat and was detained after failing to respond to distress calls. But in a letter dated Saturday, British charge d'affaires Jonathan Allen rejected each of the Iranian claims.
In a letter to Security Council president Gustavo Meza-Cuadra, Allen says the Stena Impero's transponder was switched on, that the ship was approached in Omani waters, and that it was "exercising the lawful right of transit passage in an international strait." As to the claim that the tanker had collided with an Iranian fishing boat, Mr. Allen says there is no evidence of this.