PARIS: The Iranian Foreign Ministry has justified the detention of the MSC Aries container ship on the grounds that it had infringed shipping regulations and failed to provide an "appropriate reaction" to the Iranian authorities.
The ship, which was sailing from the United Arab Emirates to India, had ignored international regulations, Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said, according to a report by the IRNA state news agency.
The Aries was detained by the navy of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) on Saturday, hours before the IRGC launched a missile and drone attack on Israel. The IRGC sees the vessel as linked to Israel.
The container ship is currently in Iranian waters between the islands of Qeshm and Hormuz and is being detained not far from three tankers confiscated by Iran last year, Tankertrackers, an online service tracking crude oil shipments, reported on X.