IMO pauses Hormuz ship evacuation plan after vessel attack

The International Maritime Organization has paused its efforts aimed at evacuating ships and seafarers stranded inside the Middle East Gulf after a vessel was attacked in the Gulf of Oman.

The pause follows a container ship being struck by an unknown projectile near the coast of Oman on Thursday, with a U.S. official telling MS Now that Iran was behind the attack.

The evacuation plan would be temporarily paused “in order to reconfirm that the necessary safety guarantees continue to be in place for the ships on our evacuation list and ​all those in the region,” Arsenio Dominguez, Secretary-General of the ​International Maritime Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations, said in a statement.

When asked about its response to the attack, a U.S. official said “we are aware of these reports and looking into them. President Trump has been clear that Iran cannot subvert the free flow of traffic in the strait.”

The IMO initiative, launched on Tuesday, was aimed at supporting hundreds of stranded ships and thousands of seafarers to sail out of the Gulf, using either a northern route via Iranian waters or a southern route via Omani waters with U.S. oversight, the IMO said earlier this week.

Shipowners had been seeking to transit the Strait of Hormuz after the U.S. and Iran struck an interim peace deal to pause hostilities for 60 days as negotiations for a permanent peace deal proceeded. Traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has partially recovered but remains well below pre-war levels.

In the week following the ceasefire, 125 vessels passed through the strait, according to Lloyd’s List Intelligence, the highest level of weekly transits since the war started in late February.

On Wednesday, Iran’s military warned vessels to not use the southern route approved by the IMO and said any new transit route through the Strait of Hormuz established without its approval is “unacceptable and dangerous,” as Tehran seeks to reinforce its grip over the vital energy waterway.

At least two vessels performed U-turns on their way out of the Middle East Gulf, according to Lloyd’s, after Iran insisted that vessels use the routes approved by Tehran. Both were using the southern route closest to the Omani coastline.

The attacked vessel carried a Singapore flag and was owned by shipping giant Evergreen, according to Lloyd’s. It did not ⁠transit under IMO’s evacuation framework, Dominguez said in the statement.

Evergreen, Singapore’s Ministry of Trade and Industry and Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not respond to CNBC’s requests for comment.

— CNBC’s Akayla Gardner, Lim Hui Jie, Dan Mangan contributed to this report.