UKMTO: Vessel Hijacked at Anchorage off Fujairah

On Thursday morning, British maritime security agency UKMTO reported that it appears that a vessel has been seized at a position on the eastern side of the Strait of Hormuz.

At about 0545 GMT, UKMTO received a report from a company security officer of a serious incident. The CSO reported that a vessel at anchor had been taken by "unauthorized personnel" at a position about 38 nautical miles to the northeast of Fujairah. It is now headed for Iran's territorial waters, the CSO said. UKMTO is investigating the circumstances of the incident, and it did not release the vessel's name.

Iran has laid claim to the control of waters off Fujairah under a newly-enlarged definition of its "sovereignty" rights in and around the Strait of Hormuz. Its newly-redrawn map of "Iranian" waters of the strait appears to cover the busy area where the missing ship was last reported.

Iran has been operating flotillas of hundreds of manned speedboats in the Strait of Hormuz in recent days, clamping down on the marine traffic that Iran claims the right to administer. Windward counted more than 340 active Iranian speedboats in various sectors of the strait on May 13, primarily in the northern and central sectors of the strategic waterway. Despite the swarm activity, a small number of vessels are getting out via the Iranian-approved northern corridor past Larak and Qeshm.