TEHRAN: Iran’s Revolutionary Guards seized a foreign oil tanker in the Persian Gulf, media houses in Iran reported.

The vessel is suspected of smuggling a large volume of fuel, media reported, without giving any details about the flag or nationality of the ship or its operator.

As per reports, The ship was carrying 700,000 litres of smuggled fuel when it was seized near Farsi Island in the western part of the Persian Gulf, off Iran’s southwestern coast near the Iraq border.

Tensions have flared in the strait as Iran resists US sanctions that are crippling its all-important oil exports and lashes out after the July 4 seizure of one of its ships near Gibraltar. Iran impounded a British tanker, the Stena Impero, in the passageway 15 days later and continues to hold it.