The UN's International Maritime Organization (IMO) has paused the planned evacuation of more than 11,000 sailors stranded in the Strait of Hormuz after a cargo ship passing through the waterway was attacked.
IMO chief Arsenio Dominguez said several boats had already been evacuated, but the agency wanted to ensure that "necessary safety guarantees" would continue to be in place.
The British maritime security agency UKMTO reported on Thursday that a ship had been struck 7.5 nautical miles southeast of Oman's port of Dahit by "an unknown projectile". No casualties were reported.
The attack came after Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) had warned that attempts to cross the strait along a route designated by the IMO would be "unacceptable and completely dangerous" and vessels should coordinate with Iran.
US officials said Iran had fired on the ship, according to US media reports. Maritime risk management firm Vanguard said the ship, the Singapore-flagged Ever Lovely, continued through the strait despite the attack.
The Ever Lovely was leading a flotilla of four other ships and followed a southern route identified by the IMO on Thursday morning, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing ship-tracking website MarineTraffic.
There was no warning from the Iranian navy to the ships on radio, according to seafarers in the flotilla who spoke to the paper.
IMO chief Dominguez said in a statement on Thursday that the vessel that was attacked "did not transit under IMO's evacuation framework".
FULL ARTICLE AT: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjwg9np904qo
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