US Central Command announced on Thursday that it bombed an oil tanker for the third time this week in the Gulf of Oman as part of its enforcement of the blockade of Iranian ports, which comes after India confirmed the previous US attack on a tanker killed three Indian crew members.
CENTCOM said its latest attack targeted the Guinea-Bissau-flagged tanker Jalveer. “A US aircraft fired two Hellfire missiles into the ship’s engine room after the crew repeatedly failed to comply with directions from US forces,” the command said.
Indian media on Thursday identified the three Indian mariners who were killed by the previous US attack on the Palau-flagged oil product tanker Settebello as Shivanand Chaurasiya, Patnala Suresh, and Aditya Sharma, a 23-year-old deck cadet who was on the ship for training to become an officer.
Aditya’s father, Rajesh Sharma, called the US attack a war crime and said his government should take a strong stance. “My last conversation with him was on Sunday. I request the government to take a strong stance against the US. I will say it is a war crime to attack a commercial ship with a missile,” Rajesh told NDTV.
“There are a lot of ways to control those cargo ships, you can send a military, you can arrest the crew members, you have no right to attack them with deadly missiles,” he added.
According to CENTCOM’s numbers, its forces have “disabled” nine civilian commercial ships while enforcing the blockade. “The blockade is being enforced impartially against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas, including all Iranian ports on the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman,” the command said.
Hellbound and Down 