PNN – Maritime tracking reports indicate that commercial ships must present their documents and travel through designated corridors approved by Tehran to transit the Strait of Hormuz. According to the report, passage through the vital waterway is now restricted exclusively to ships with prior authorization from Iran.
According to the report of Pakistan News Network; the latest navigation data published by Bloomberg on Sunday shows a complete halt to maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz. According to the report, passage through the vital waterway is now restricted exclusively to ships with prior authorization from Iran.
Just days after the Iranian parliament announced a 12-point comprehensive plan to manage maritime transit through the vital waterway, satellite data shows that commercial traffic in the Persian Gulf will be under full Iranian control. According to the document, detailed by Ali Nikzad, the deputy speaker of the Iranian parliament, passage by ships from belligerent countries will be subject to payment of war indemnity, and other ships will also have to obtain Iranian permission and approval.
Oil tankers pass with Tehran’s coordination
This week, maritime activity in the strait has been reduced to a minimum, with only a handful of ships linked to regional allies such as China and Pakistan able to pass through. According to tracking data, the Pakistani tanker Khairpur, carrying 511,000 barrels of oil from Kuwait, passed through the strait on Thursday night after coordination with Tehran and following an approved route near the islands of Qeshm and Lark. The new system appears to require ships to present full documentation before departure, and to pass through a controlled corridor after receiving an approval code and being escorted by IRGC boats. Another gas giant passes through the Strait with Iran’s permission. The Marshall Islands-flagged Srushti, a giant tanker carrying 45,000 tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) purchased by Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), left the Strait on Saturday in a rare move with Iran’s permission. The ship took a northern route approved by Tehran, passing the Lark and Qeshm Islands near Bandar Abbas and headed for the Indian Ocean.
India’s energy interests, facing a severe shortage of cooking gas, have forced them to seek permission to transit through Tehran. Washington on the Sidelines of Iran’s Surveillance as Iran’s legitimate control of the Persian Gulf grows; the US Navy is unable to exert effective influence in the region. News sources report that several offers from shipping companies for escorts from the US fleet have so far been rejected due to the “high risk.” Saudi Arabia, which was called in earlier this week to transport 4.2 million barrels of oil to Egyptian power plants, also withdrew its tankers at the last minute due to a lack of necessary permits.
The new maritime order of the Middle East
This new order reflects the fact that control of the Strait of Hormuz is no longer under the previous rules of trans-regional powers. As Reuters recently reported, senior Iranian officials have stated that after the war, the Strait of Hormuz will never return to its former state. Any commercial traffic through the passage now requires compliance with regulations and obtaining permits from Iranian military and port authorities. According to data from the maritime intelligence company Kepler, the average daily traffic of uncoordinated ships in the Strait of Hormuz has decreased by more than 95 percent since the February attacks by the US and the Israeli regime and the subsequent closure by Western agents.
Iran’s geopolitical balance is increasing Al Jazeera’s senior economic correspondent writes in an analytical report that Tehran has effectively ended the region’s unipolarity by changing the power equations in the Persian Gulf. As Reuters has also confirmed, in the current situation, any commercial or military operations in the Persian Gulf waters pass through Iran’s military “filter”. Given that nearly 20 percent of the world’s oil passes through this strait, it seems that in the coming months, not energy prices, but the geopolitical formula and balance will be the priority for determining applicants for passage.