By Enas Alashray
DUBAI, July 14 (Reuters) - One Indian crew member was killed and eight others were wounded when two Emirati oil tankers were struck by Iranian cruise missiles in the Strait of Hormuz, the United Arab Emirates Ministry of Defence said on Tuesday, in the latest escalation in the strategic waterway.
Abu Dhabi National Oil Company's shipping arm ADNOC L&S later confirmed the very large crude carriers (VLCCs) Mombasa B and Al Bahiyah were struck while transiting Hormuz and had sustained
"significant damage".
UAE state oil giant ADNOC has been among the most active participants in a U.S. military-led operation to move Gulf crude out to international buyers through ship-to-ship (STS) transfers beyond the Strait of Hormuz, Reuters reported last month. U.S. Central Command, which has not acknowledged the STS transfers, said on July 12 it had facilitated the transit of more than 800 vessels and over 400 million barrels of crude through the strait over the previous two months.
The UAE defence ministry said the tankers were targeted in the southern lane of the strait while in Omani territorial waters. The dead crew member was aboard the Mombasa, it said.
Of the eight wounded, four were seriously injured. Six of the wounded were Indian nationals and two were Ukrainian nationals, the ministry said.
The attacks caused material damage to both tankers after fires broke out on board. The ministry said the fires had been brought under control.
It condemned what it called a "blatant attack" and said the UAE retained "its full right to respond to this escalation".
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said on Tuesday that two "offending" supertankers had been hit and disabled in the Strait of Hormuz after ignoring repeated warnings, turning off navigation systems and attempting to pass through what the Guards described as a mined route.
The IRGC's statement did not name the vessels or say whether it was referring to the same tankers cited by the UAE Ministry of Defence.
In the statement, the Guards accused the U.S. of "inciting vessels to use an illegal route" and said cooperation with the "aggressor enemy" would only result in damage, delays in reopening the Strait of Hormuz and a global energy crisis.
Separately, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency said on Tuesday that a tanker had been hit by an unknown projectile while travelling 40 nautical miles northeast of Oman's Qalhat.
UKMTO said the tanker's master reported that the projectile struck the starboard-side engine room and that all crew were safe.
Reuters could not immediately verify whether the UKMTO report referred to the same incident as the one reported by the UAE's Ministry of Defence.
The latest incidents in the waterway come after weeks of heightened tensions since the war broke out on February 28, when the U.S. and Israel launched attacks on Iran.
The U.S. military carried out a third consecutive night of strikes against Iran on Monday as President Donald Trump reinstated a blockade of Iranian shipping and proposed charging a 20% fee to guard the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran's top joint military command said the U.S. had no role in determining the future of the waterway and would not be allowed to intervene.
The conflict has destabilised the Gulf and spread across the region, with Iran attacking U.S. bases in multiple countries. It has also thrown into question an interim U.S.-Iranian agreement signed last month to reopen the strait and halt hostilities.
Before the conflict began in February, around a fifth of the world's oil and gas traffic passed through Hormuz daily, delivering more than 15 million barrels of fuel to global markets worth at least $1.2 billion.
(Reporting by Enas Alashray, Menna Alaa El Din and Yousef Saba; Editing by Nia Williams and Lincoln Feast.)
