DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – A South Korean oil tanker detained by Iran for months amid a dispute over billions of dollars seized by Seoul was released early Friday and departed just hours for further talks between Tehran and the world powers over his country. torn nuclear deal.
Data from MarineTraffic.com showed that the MT Hankuk Chemi left Bandar Abbas in the early morning hours. Friday afternoon it had passed safely through the Strait of Hormuz off the east coast of the United Arab Emirates.
South Korea’s Foreign Ministry said Iran released the tanker and its captain after it seized the ship in January. The ministry says the Hankuk Chemi left an Iranian port around 6 a.m. local time after completing an administrative process.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh later confirmed that Iran had released the ship.
“At the request of the owner and the Korean government, the order to release the ship was issued by the prosecutor,” Khatibzadeh said, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.
The owner of the vessel, DM Shipping Co. Ltd. from Busan, South Korea, could not be immediately reached for comment.
The Hankuk Chemi had traveled from a petrochemical plant in Jubail, Saudi Arabia, to Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates when Revolutionary Guard forces stormed the ship in January, forcing the ship to change course and travel to Iran.
Iran had accused MT Hankuk Chemi of polluting the waters in the crucial Strait of Hormuz. But the seizure was widely seen as an attempt to pressure Seoul to release about $ 7 billion in Iranian assets trapped in South Korean banks amid tough US sanctions against Iran. Iran released the 20-man crew in February, but continued to detain the ship and captain while demanding that South Korea release frozen Iranian assets.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry did not acknowledge the dispute over the fund when announcing the ship’s release, with Khatibzadeh only saying that the captain and tanker had a clean track record in the region.
But a South Korean Foreign Ministry official, speaking under the regulations on condition of anonymity, said Seoul’s willingness to resolve the issue of Iranian assets trapped in South Korea “may have a positive impact. has “on Iran’s decision to release the ship.
The official said Iran had recognized South Korea’s efforts to resolve the dispute when it became clear that the issue was “not just about South Korea’s ability and efforts alone” and was “intertwined” with the negotiations. on the return to the failed Tehran nuclear deal.
The reversal of the freeze requires the consent of several countries, including the US, which imposed sweeping sanctions on Iran’s oil and banking sectors in 2018. The official said South Korea is in close communication with other countries about the frozen Iranian assets.
In January, the UN said Iran topped the list of countries owing money to the world organization with a minimum bill of more than $ 16 million. If Iran is not paid it could lose its right to vote, as required by the UN Charter.
“We expect to make significant progress in terms of paying the UN dues,” an unnamed official from the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs quoted by the country’s Yonhap news agency. “We have also exported about $ 30 million worth of medical equipment since we resumed humanitarian trade with Iran last April.”
Iran later announced that it expected South Korean Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun to travel to Tehran for a two-day visit from Sunday. Yonhap said the trip would be a South Korean prime minister’s first visit to Iran in 44 years – before the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran. Chung previously visited Iran in August 2017 as the then President of the National Assembly.
The development came when Iran and world powers were due to resume negotiations in Vienna on Friday to break the deadlock over US sanctions on Iran and Iranian violations of the nuclear deal. The 2015 nuclear accord, which then-President Donald Trump left three years later, provided Iran with sanctions relief in exchange for restrictions on its nuclear program.
The Associated Press authors Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran contributed to this report.