US naval blockade forces Iranian tankers to anchor off Sri Lanka and Malaysia as crude exports halt

More than a dozen empty Iranian oil tankers are floating off the southern coast of Sri Lanka with nowhere to go. The US naval blockade of Iranian ports, reimposed on July 14, has effectively severed the country’s crude export lifeline, and the tankers anchored near Galle are the most visible proof. Since mid-July, not a single tanker bound for destinations beyond the Persian Gulf has loaded crude at Kharg Island, Iran’s primary oil export terminal. The blockade by the numbers US Central Command reported that by August 24, its forces had redirected 71 commercial vessels attempting to breach the blockade. Three ships were disabled. Two were boarded. The blockade still permits humanitarian traffic, a distinction the US has been careful to maintain for legal and diplomatic purposes. Ship-tracking organizations United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) and TankerTrackers have confirmed the scale of the disruption. Approximately 13 empty Iranian-flagged tankers, including vessels belonging to the state-owned National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC), currently sit in Sri Lanka’s exclusive economic zone. Some estimates put the total number of Iranian tankers staying away from home ports as high as ...