Iran’s Ports and Maritime Organization said a court had ordered the ship seized after ruling against Maersk Line in a case about debts brought by Pars Talaie, an Iranian company.
Tasnim, an Iranian news agency, quoted a Pars Talaie lawyer as saying the debt involved a cargo that Pars Talaie hired Maersk to take from the Iranian port of Abadan to Dubai more than a decade ago but which had never arrived.
Maersk said it was not the owner of the ship and that it was trying to establish the facts of any legal case. Rickmers said the Maersk Tigris was owned by “various private investors”.
Maersk said the vessel was confronted in international waters while Rickmers said the incident occurred in a widely recognized international shipping lane.
So, the decade-old suit was just a convenient pretext for stealing a container ship by force. Cute.