A French-owned container ship was “struck by an unknown projectile” in the Strait of Hormuz overnight, causing damage to the vessel and injuring crew members, the owner has confirmed.
Container ship San Antonio was attacked in the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday night while transiting the Strait of Hormuz eastward — out of the Gulf and towards India — triggering an evacuation operation to get crew injured in the attack to medical care. The ship, which is owned by French Marseille-headquartered maritime transport group Compagnie maritime d’affrètement – Compagnie générale maritime (Maritime Freighting Company – General Maritime Company, CMA CGM) was damaged in the attack.
Britain’s Royal Navy-run UKMTO maritime security service logged the incident on Tuesday night, stating they had “received a report of an incident within the Strait of Hormuz. A verified source reported a cargo vessel has been struck by an unknown projectile.”. CMA CGM confirmed their ship had been involved on Wednesday morning.
The ship was last seen by ground-based transponder trackers off Dubai on Tuesday morning, implying the ship attempted, as others have already succeeded in doing, to run the gauntlet of the Strait while ‘dark’ and not advertising its location. In an earlier case, a CMA CGM ship successfully transited the Strait by using its AIS transponder to broadcast the message “OWNER FRANCE” as a means of avoiding the attention of the IRGC.
Indeed, France’s President Emmanuel Macron has gone to great lengths to stress that his nation is not a party to the conflict since it began, refusing to give aid to his NATO ally the United States, and personally reaching out to Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian this week. Macron moved fast after CMA CGM’s announcement to reassure the public that France itself hadn’t been targeted in this strike, and so wasn’t being dragged into the war, pointing out that while the ship is French-owned, it is registered for legal purposes in Malta, and was flying the Maltese flag at the time of the strike.
He said on Wednesday morning: “France was in no way the target”, reports Le Figaro.
The Tuesday night strike on the French-owned container ship came as President Trump announced he was suspending the escort mission through the Strait from the Persian Gulf, hinting a “final agreement” to bring peace to the region was close.
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