Former leader of Revolutionary Guard says impounded Iranian oil tanker must be released

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

A former leader of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has said the Islamic Republic should consider seizing a British oil tanker in response to the UK military detaining an Iranian vessel off the coast of Gibraltar.

Mohsen Rezaei, who led the Guard during Iran’s 1980s “tanker war” in the Persian Gulf, made the comments the day after nearly 30 Royal Marines were deployed to impound the oil tanker Grace 1.

“If England does not release the Iranian oil tanker, the duty ... [of Iran] is to respond and seize one English oil tanker,” Rezaei said on Friday.

Britain’s Foreign Office said it would not respond to every comment about the incident that emerged from Iran, and reiterated its position that the action came at the request of Gibraltar to halt a vessel believed to be bound for Syria.

Tehran has been accused of sabotaging oil tankers in the strait of Hormuz in an attempt at economic retaliation against the US after Donald Trump pulled out of the nuclear deal and imposed sanctions on Iran.

EU sanctions prevent the Syrian regime from importing oil, and Gibraltar said on Thursday that it believed the Grace 1 and its 2m barrels of Iranian oil were bound for the Banyas refinery in Syria.

Since then, Gibraltar and Spain have become embroiled in a row about the seizure and its ultimate purpose, with Madrid saying the Grace 1 was intercepted because of a request from the US to the UK.

Spain said on Friday it planned to lodge a formal complaint about the action, because it considers the sea around Gibraltar to be part of its territorial waters, while the British regard it as theirs.

“We are studying the circumstances and looking at how this affects our sovereignty,” Josep Borell, Spain’s acting foreign minister, said.

In response to the Spanish claims, Gibraltar said: “There has been no political request at any time from any government that the Gibraltar government should act or not act.”

The territory’s government said it only organised the seizure with the help of the Royal Marines “as a direct result only of it having reasonable grounds to believe that the vessel was acting in breach of established EU sanctions against Syria”.

Nevertheless, the seizure was hailed enthusiastically overnight by a key member of the Trump administration.

John Bolton, the US national security adviser, tweeted: “Excellent news: UK has detained the supertanker Grace 1 laden with Iranian oil bound for Syria in violation of EU sanctions.

“America and our allies will continue to prevent regimes in Tehran and Damascus from profiting off this illicit trade.”

The Grace 1 was likely to remain impounded for several weeks, British sources indicated. Although its exact ownership is unclear, Tehran said the tanker was Iranian owned.

After the seizure, the British ambassador to Tehran, Rob Macaire, was summoned to explain the action. After the meeting, an Iranian foreign ministry official told the Mehr news agency: “This is the very bullying policy of the US, about which the European countries have been always protesting.” He said the seizure was “tantamount to banditry”.

Macaire had told the Iranians that he and the British government had supported the action by the Gibraltarian authorities to enforce sanctions against the regime of Bashar al-Assad, and supplied the Royal Marines on that basis.

The 28 members of the ship’s crew were questioned onboard by Gibraltarian authorities. They were mostly Indian nationals as well as some Ukrainians and Pakistanis, the territory’s government said. Pictures released by the UK’s ministry of defence showed marines on board the vessel.

According to official reports in Spain, British authorities notified Madrid that the ship was about to be boarded by marines and the operation was closely watched by a civil guard patrol boat.

But a Spanish foreign ministry spokesman added: “Spain didn’t want to interfere because the issue was compliance with European Union sanctions.”

Iran has said it intends to enrich its uranium stocks this weekend to an unspecified level beyond the 3.67% allowed under the nuclear deal, in protest against the US sanctions.

• This article was amended on 8 July 2019 to correct “international waters” to “territorial waters”.