{"id":218714,"date":"2019-06-14T02:37:06","date_gmt":"2019-06-14T06:37:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=218714"},"modified":"2019-06-14T02:37:06","modified_gmt":"2019-06-14T06:37:06","slug":"us-says-iran-took-mine-off-tanker-iran-denies-involvement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/06\/14\/us-says-iran-took-mine-off-tanker-iran-denies-involvement\/","title":{"rendered":"US says Iran took mine off tanker; Iran denies involvement"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
The U.S. Navy rushed to assist the stricken vessels in the Gulf of Oman, off the coast of\u00a0Iran, including one that was set ablaze Thursday by an explosion. (Shutterstock photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The U.S. military on Friday released a video it said shows\u00a0Iran’s Revolutionary Guard removing an unexploded limpet mine from one of the oil tankers targeted near the Strait of Hormuz, suggesting the Islamic Republic sought to remove evidence of its involvement from the scene.\u00a0Iran\u00a0denies being involved, accusing the U.S. instead of waging an \u201cIranophobic campaign\u201d against it.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Navy rushed to assist the stricken vessels in the Gulf of Oman, off the coast of\u00a0Iran, including one that was set ablaze Thursday by an explosion.<\/p>\n

The ships’ operators offered no immediate explanation on who or what caused the damage against the Norwegian-owned MT Front Altair and the Japanese-owned Kokuka Courageous. Each was loaded with petroleum products, and the Front Altair burned for hours, sending up a column of thick, black smoke.<\/p>\n

While\u00a0Iran\u00a0has denied being involved in the attack, Tehran previously used mines against oil tankers in 1987 and 1988 in the \u201cTanker War,\u201d when the U.S. Navy escorted ships through the region.<\/p>\n

The black-and-white footage, as well as still photographs released by the U.S. military’s Central Command on Friday, appeared to show the limpet mine on the Kokuka Courageous.<\/p>\n

A Revolutionary Guard patrol boat pulled alongside the ship and removed the mine, Central Command spokesman Capt. Bill Urban said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe U.S. and the international community stand ready to defend our interests, including the freedom of navigation,\u201d Urban said. \u201cThe United States has no interest in engaging in a new conflict in the Middle East. However, we will defend our interests.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iran\u00a0earlier denied involvement via a statement from its mission to the United Nations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe U.S. economic war and terrorism against the Iranian people as well as its massive military presence in the region have been and continue to be the main sources of insecurity and instability in the wider Persian Gulf region and the most significant threat to its peace and security,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile in Tokyo, the owner of the Kokuka Courageous said its sailors saw \u201cflying objects\u201d before the attack, suggesting it wasn’t damaged by mines. Company president Yutaka Katada offered no evidence for his claim, which contradicts the U.S. military account.<\/p>\n

Katada also said crew members saw an Iranian naval ship nearby, but did not specify whether this was before or after the attacks.<\/p>\n

The suspected attacks occurred at dawn Thursday about 40 kilometres (25 miles) off the southern coast of\u00a0Iran.\u00a0The Front Altair, loaded with the flammable hydrocarbon mixture naphtha from the United Arab Emirates, radioed for help as it caught fire. A short time later, the Kokuka Courageous, loaded with methanol from Saudi Arabia and Qatar, also called for help.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Navy sent a destroyer, the USS Bainbridge, to assist, said Cmdr. Joshua Frey, a 5th Fleet spokesman. He described the ships as being hit in a \u201creported attack,\u201d without elaborating.<\/p>\n

Thursday’s attack resembled that of an attack in May targeting four oil tankers off the nearby Emirati port of Fujairah. U.S. officials similarly accused\u00a0Iran\u00a0of targeting the ships with limpet mines, which are magnetic and attach to the hulls of a ship. The mines disable, but don’t sink, a vessel.<\/p>\n

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told journalists on Thursday that the U.S. assessment of\u00a0Iran’s involvement was based in part on intelligence, as well as the expertise needed for the operation. It was also based on recent incidents in the region, which the U.S. also blamed on\u00a0Iran, including the use of limpet mines in the Fujairah attack, he said. He also tied\u00a0Iran\u00a0to a drone attack by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels on a crucial Saudi oil pipeline around the same time.<\/p>\n

\u201cTaken as a whole, these unprovoked attacks present a clear threat to international peace and security, a blatant assault on the freedom of navigation and an unacceptable campaign of escalating tension by\u00a0Iran,\u201d Pompeo said. He didn’t elaborate and took no questions.<\/p>\n

Iran\u00a0denied being involved in the attacks last month and its foreign minister questioned the timing of Thursday’s incidents, given that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was meeting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran.<\/p>\n

Pompeo noted that Abe had asked\u00a0Iran\u00a0to enter into talks with Washington but Tehran \u201crejected\u201d the overture.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe supreme leader’s government then insulted Japan by attacking a Japanese-owned oil tanker just outside Iranian waters, threatening the lives of the entire crew, creating a maritime emergency,\u201d Pompeo added.<\/p>\n

At the United Nations, the Security Council held closed consultations on the tanker incidents late Thursday at the request of the United States but took no action.<\/p>\n

Tensions have escalated in the Mideast as\u00a0Iran\u00a0appears poised to break the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, an accord that President Donald Trump repudiated last year. In the deal, Tehran agreed to limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of crippling sanctions. Now,\u00a0Iran\u00a0is threatening to resume enriching uranium closer to weapons-grade levels if European nations don’t offer it new terms to the deal by July 7.<\/p>\n

Already,\u00a0Iran\u00a0says it quadrupled its production of low-enriched uranium. Meanwhile, U.S. sanctions have cut off opportunities for\u00a0Iran\u00a0to trade its excess uranium and heavy water abroad, putting Tehran on course to violate terms of the nuclear deal regardless.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia said early Friday its military intercepted five drones launched by Yemen’s Houthi rebels targeting the kingdom, including the Abha regional airport. The kingdom said a similar attack Wednesday on the Abha airport wounded 26 people.<\/p>\n

——<\/p>\n

Associated Press writers Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations, Aya Batrawy in Dubai, David Rising in Berlin, Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo, Lolita C. Baldor, Zeke Miller and Susannah George in Washington and Amir Vahdat and Nasser Karimi in Tehran,\u00a0Iran, contributed to this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — The U.S. military on Friday released a video it said shows\u00a0Iran’s Revolutionary Guard removing an …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":201230,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-218714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","category-news-w","mauthors-jon-gambrell","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218714"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218714\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":218715,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218714\/revisions\/218715"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}