Lebanon dismisses Turkish claims on Iranian oil tanker

Lebanon dismissed Turkish claims on Friday that it would receive the Adrian Darya, an Iranian tanker which has been bouncing around the Mediterranean amid US warnings over its valuable oil cargo.

Every change of tack from the huge vessel, with its cargo of 2.1 barrels worth around $140 million, has sparked intense speculation.

It was detained for six weeks by the British territory of Gibraltar and released despite a US attempt to keep it detained on suspicion that its cargo was bound for Syria.

While Iran has denied selling the oil to its Damascus ally, experts said the likely scenario was for a ship-to-ship transfer, with a Syrian port as the final destination.

Maritime traffic monitors had shown that the Adrian Darya’s latest listed destinations, which are not necessarily the next approved port of call, were in Turkey.

After tracking sites showed Mersin as its destination, it then switched to Iskenderun, prompting a reaction from Turkey’s foreign minister on Friday.

“This tanker is not heading actually to Iskenderun (in Turkey), this tanker is heading to Lebanon,” Mevlut Cavusoglu said during a visit to Oslo.

Lebanon swiftly dismissed the scenario, stressing that it never buys crude oil because it simply does not have refineries.

“The energy ministry does not buy crude oil from any country and Lebanon does not own a crude oil refinery,” Energy Minister Nada Boustani said in a statement.

She added that Lebanon had not received any docking request from the tanker.

“There is also no request for the Adrian Darya 1 oil tanker to enter Lebanon,” Boustani said.

However, Cavusoglu later said he wanted to clarify that an Iranian tanker at the centre of a dispute between Washington and Tehran was headed towards Lebanese territorial waters, not a Lebanese port.

Earlier, he said the ship was headed to Lebanon’s main port. “I didn’t mean that this tanker is going to a Lebanese port, but according to the information coordinates it is heading to the territorial waters of the country,” he told reporters later at an Oslo forum.

“It doesn’t mean that it is going to reach a Lebanese port. But for sure...it is not coming to Turkish ports either.”

According to maritime traffic monitoring websites, the huge tanker is currently just west of the island nation of Cyprus.

Iran said on Monday it had “sold the oil” aboard the tanker and that the owner will decide the destination.

It did not identify the buyer or say whether the oil had been sold before or after the tanker’s detention in the Strait of Gibraltar, on Spain’s southern tip.

The ship was seized by Gibraltar police and British special forces on July 4 and held for six weeks on suspicion of shipping oil to Syria in breach of European union sanctions.

But Iran denied the charge and said it could not name the actual destination due to United States “economic terrorism” and its sanctions on Iran’s oil sales.

In July, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps impounded a British-flagged tanker in strategic Gulf waters. Britain called it a tit-for-tat move but Tehran denied any connection.

A court in the British territory ordered the tanker’s release on Aug.15 despite a last-minute legal bid by the United States to have it detained.

The Adrian Darya 1 set sail for the eastern Mediterranean three days after it was released.

According to maritime traffic monitoring websites, the huge tanker has changed direction multiple times, following no apparent logic.

The specialised TankerTrackers social media account noted on Friday after the vessel listed Iskenderun as its destination that little could be read into it.

“Consider this just a record update rather than anything substantial. We believe a transfer is still a few days away. Turkey will not import this oil,” it said.

It earlier described it as “aimlessly moseying around the Med.”

Tensions between arch-enemies Iran and the US have soared ever since Washington stepped up its campaign of “maximum pressure” against Tehran and reimposed sanctions after leaving the landmark 2015 nuclear deal last year.

Agencies