Empire Navigation, owners of the Greek-owned and Marshall Island-flagged tanker St. Nikolas that was seized by five gunmen off the coast of Oman on Thursday, confirmed on Friday that the ship has anchored at the port of Bandar Abbas in Iran since Thursday.
Empire Navigation said it has not been able to reach the crew after the takeover, as the hijackers have turned off the satellite-based communications system. It said that all Greek and international authorities as well as relatives of the crew members were notified as soon as the event occurred.
The tanker left a few days ago from Basra (Iraq) loaded with rougly 145,000 of crude oil bound for Aliaga (Turkiye) via the Suez Canal. The vessel’s charterer was Tupras. It has 20 crew members (19 Filipinos and a Greek).
The Greek foreign ministry is in charge of ensuring the safety and repatriation of the Greek national on the crew.
