A former leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on Friday threatened to seize a British tanker if the UK doesn’t release the Iranian ship detained in Gibraltar on suspicion of carrying crude oil to Syria in violation of EU sanctions.
“If Britain does not release the Iranian oil tanker, it is the authorities duty to seize a British oil tanker,” tweeted Mohsen Rezaei, who is now secretary of Iran’s Expediency Council, a powerful state body.
“Islamic Iran in its 40-year history has never initiated hostilities in any battles but has also never hesitated in responding to bullies,” Rezaei wrote.
The IRGC is the elite military unit, which answers only to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that took responsibility for the downing of a US drone earlier this month.
Iran demanded earlier Friday that Britain immediately release the oil tanker, accusing it of acting at the bidding of the United States.
A senior foreign ministry official “described the UK move as unacceptable” in a meeting with British ambassador Rob Macaire, who had been summoned to hear a formal protest, the ministry said in a statement.
He “called for the immediate release of the oil tanker, given that it has been seized at the request of the US, based on the information currently available,” the statement added.