With the US racing to unblock the Strait of Hormuz and stabilise soaring oil prices, a report emerged that Iran has sown an “estimated 10 mines” in the vital chokepoint, where 20% of global oil exports pass through.
Deployed stealthily, often by frogmen from small boats masquerading as fishing vessels, these weapons evade detection, rendering clearance operations challenging. Hormuz Strait is a narrow waterway between the Arabian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, making it the most critical maritime chokepoint for global energy trade.
Read more…
Source: Gulf News
Sign up for the Counter-IED Report Newsletters
The latest news and insights delivered right to your inbox
Related:
- PyroTerrorism Not New, ‘Inspired’ in Past by Al Qaeda
November 24, 2016
The idea of attacking a targeted population by setting fire to the area — while primitive – is not at all new. Arabs from the Palestinian Authority have used such methods before to attack Israel, but the idea did not originate with them. The English-language Inspire Magazine published in 2012 by Al Qaeda in the Arabian ...
- The £1bn of weapons flowing from Europe to Middle East
July 27, 2016
AEastern European countries have approved the discreet sale of more than €1bn of weapons in the past four years to Middle Eastern countries that are known to ship arms to Syria, an investigation has found. Thousands of assault rifles such as AK-47s, mortar shells, rocket launchers, anti-tank weapons and heavy machine guns are being routed ...
- Saudi Arabia-led coalition has used UK-manufactured cluster bombs in Yemen – new evidence
May 23, 2016
Amnesty International has written to prime minister David Cameron and other senior ministers demanding a full Government inquiry into new evidence that Saudi Arabia-led coalition forces have used UK-manufactured cluster bombs – which may have killed and injured civilians, including children – in the conflict in Yemen. During recent field research in Sa’da, Hajjah, and Sanaa ...
- Yemen: Children tormented by landmines and unexploded ordnance
July 30, 2013
Unexploded remnants of Yemen’s conflicts have killed and injured dozens of children and threaten the country’s fragile return to peace. Thirteen-year-old Nakhlah Ramadhan was tending sheep with her younger sister Fatima on the outskirts of the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, when she stepped on a landmine. She was killed instantly; Fatima was seriously injured. Read more… Source: United Nations ...