(Reuters) – Two tankers bound for India sailed through the Strait of Hormuz on Monday carrying liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) loaded in the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, although overall traffic through the critical waterway remained blocked.
Hundreds of vessels and some 20,000 seafarers have remained stranded inside the Gulf since Tehran threatened to attack ships attempting to leave via the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20% of global oil and liquefied natural gas normally flow.
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The Pine Gas tanker sailed through the Strait with the Jag Vasant following close by, ship tracking data on the MarineTraffic platform showed.
The Pine Gas broadcast a message identifying itself as “India ship and crew”, according to separate LSEG ship tracking data.
India’s Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, confirmed that the two Indian-flagged tankers, carrying more than 92,000 tonnes of LPG, had sailed through Hormuz with their Indian crews on board.
The vessels were expected to reach ports in India between March 26-28, the ministry said.
MARITIME CORRIDOR EFFORT
An Indian government source told Reuters separately the Indian navy had instructed the two vessels to cross the Strait from Iran’s coastline.
The vessels had made stops at anchorages in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates to load the gas, ship tracking on LSEG showed.
In a separate sailing, a tanker carrying oil products crossed the Strait on March 21 bound for India, Kpler data showed.
Countries at the U.N.’s shipping agency agreed last week to work towards a safe maritime corridor to evacuate commercial ships from the Gulf and protect seafarers stranded due to the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, which began on February 28. No timeframe has been given for the initiative.
“Three weeks into the Hormuz shutdown, crude tanker markets remain distorted,” shipbroker Clarksons said on Monday.
“Traffic through the strait is down about 95% from pre-war levels, with Iranian-linked ships still moving.”
IRAN TRAFFIC UNHINDERED
Shipping through Iranian ports has been broadly unhindered by the war, according to ship tracking data and sources.
At least 14 Iran-flagged oil tankers have reached Asian waters around the Singapore Strait with oil cargoes since February 28, according to analysis from U.S. advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), which monitors Iran-related tanker traffic through ship and satellite tracking.
Shipments were briefly paused at the start of the war but resumed soon after, the analysis showed. UANI senior advisor Charlie Brown described Iranian oil flows as “business as usual”.
Further data from UANI showed that 15 separate Iran-flagged oil tankers were headed back to the Gulf from Asia empty after arriving with cargoes.
The first Western-linked ship carrying grains known to have docked in Iran since February 28 — a Greek-operated dry bulk vessel — arrived in the Iranian port of Bandar Imam Khomeini on Sunday, according to data from Lloyd’s List Intelligence and a source familiar with the matter.
The vessel had sailed from Canada via the Cape before reaching the Gulf, separate ship tracking from MarineTraffic showed.
Reporting by Jonathan Saul, Nidhi Verma, Saurabh Sharma and Edward McAllister; Editing by Toby Chopra and Aidan Lewis
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