“She is able to leave as soon as she organizes the logistics necessary in order to sail a ship of that size wherever it's going next. Could be today, could be tomorrow”,Gibraltar's Chief Minister Fabian Picardo told BBC, according to Sputnik on Friday.
When asked about the US launching a last-ditch bid to seize the Grace1, Picardo said “those will be determinations made purely objectively and independently by those authorities and then subject to once again the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of Gibraltar.”
Gibraltar police and British Royal Forces seized the Grace 1, carrying 2.1 million barrels of Iranian oil, on July 4, provoking a diplomatic crisis, followed by Iran's seizing of the UK oil tanker Stena Impero in the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran stresses that seizure of the UK-flagged oil tanker took place after it ignored international maritime rules, while calling the UK action in capturing the Iranian supertanker 'an act of piracy.'
After the release of Grace 1, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif described the US attempts to take control of the vessel yesterday as 'an attempted piracy.'
KI/PR