DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — An American-owned oil tanker long suspected of carrying sanctioned Iranian crude oil offloaded its cargo near Texas on Sunday, tracking data showed, even as Tehran has threatened to target shipping in the Persian Gulf over it.
Ship-tracking data analyzed by The Associated Press showed the Marshall Islands-flagged Suez Rajan began the hourslong ship-to-ship transfer of its oil to another tanker, the MR Euphrates, near Galveston, some 70 kilometers (45 miles) southeast of Houston.
The fate of the cargo aboard the Suez Rajan has become mired in the wider tensions between the U.S. and the Islamic Republic, even as Tehran and Washington work toward a trade of billions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets in South Korea for the release of five Iranian-Americans held in Tehran. Iran has been trying to evade sanctions and continue selling its oil abroad, while the U.S. and its allies have been seizing cargoes since 2019 after the country’s nuclear deal allowing the trade collapsed. …
https://apnews.com/article/iran-us-tensions-suez-rajan-tanker-oil-3f257407678b844e5c71c39334866bb1