Iran Says Tankers Hit Sea Mines in Hormuz: What the Law Says

Introduction

Claims that Strait of Hormuz mines struck commercial oil tankers in November 2026 have raised a question extending beyond the immediate attacks: can a State lawfully lay naval mines in an international strait used by foreign merchant ships? Iranian military authorities have reported several tanker explosions and fires, attributing them to vessels entering areas Tehran considers unauthorized. Independent maritime security reporting confirms attacks on commercial shipping, but it does not establish that every reported explosion was caused by a naval mine.

International law does not impose a universal prohibition on naval mining during armed conflict. Mines may serve legitimate military purposes, including restricting enemy naval movements. Their use is nevertheless constrained by international humanitarian law, the protection of merchant shipping, the law of neutrality, and applicable rules governing navigation through international straits. A minefield that indiscriminately endangers civilian vessels cannot be justified merely by describing the affected waters as a military exclusion zone.

The legal position in the Strait of Hormuz is particularly demanding because Iran and Oman border an international navigation route, while their treaty positions differ. Oman is a party to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS); Iran signed but did not ratify it. The principal questions concern the evidence of mine use, the obligations that apply independently of treaty ratification, and the circumstances in which interference with commercial shipping becomes internationally wrongful.

1. What Is Known About the Reported Mine Strikes?

The November incidents occurred amid continuing attacks and restrictions affecting commercial navigation in and around the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian military statements attributed explosions involving oil tankers to sea mines, while maritime security organizations recorded attacks whose precise mechanisms were not always established.

These reports require careful separation. A military announcement may identify the weapon allegedly used without providing independently verifiable evidence. A maritime security advisory may confirm that a vessel was damaged without determining who attacked it or whether the weapon was a mine, missile, drone, or another projectile.

The distinction is decisive for legal responsibility. The law governing naval mines can be examined even while the facts remain disputed. A conclusion that Iran breached a particular rule through a particular mine strike, however, requires evidence concerning the weapon, its deployment, the location of the incident, and the conduct attributable to Iranian authorities.

1.1 Iranian Military Announcements

During November 2026, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Navy issued statements concerning tankers allegedly struck by mines while using routes Iranian authorities had not authorized. Reuters reported further Iranian claims on November 12 and 13, including explosions and fires involving unidentified commercial vessels.

The announcements linked the reported incidents to Iran's attempt to control shipping movements through the strait. They did not provide sufficient publicly established information to determine the identities, flags, cargoes, or precise positions of all the vessels concerned. The reports also leave open whether successive announcements described separate attacks or developments in incidents already reported.

Iran's characterization of a route as unauthorized is relevant to understanding its military position, but it does not determine the vessel's legal status. Even a genuine breach of an applicable navigational regulation would not automatically transform a merchant tanker into a lawful military target. That assessment depends on separate rules governing civilian vessels and the conduct of hostilities.

1.2 Independent Evidence of Attacks on Shipping

The Joint Maritime Information Center (JMIC), in its November 12, 2026 advisory, documented several attacks involving tankers in the Strait of Hormuz and the Arabian Gulf. Its records included an unnamed tanker reportedly struck northeast of Lima, Oman, on November 10, and an attack on NCC FAJR north of Khasab on November 11. The advisory also recorded incidents involving FUJAIRAH ENERGY and DOMINICA PROSPERITY in the Arabian Gulf (JMIC, 2026, p. 1).

The reported weapon was not uniformly identified as a mine. In several entries, maritime authorities described an unidentified projectile. That terminology confirms neither a mine strike nor the absence of mines elsewhere. The incidents may involve different methods of attack, and there is insufficient evidence to match every independently documented vessel to a specific Iranian announcement.

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) maintained a separate register of confirmed incidents. As of November 11, 2026, it recorded 136 confirmed incidents and 25 seafarer fatalities across the covered Middle Eastern maritime region. The register included damaged vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and surrounding waters. These are regional security figures, not a count of confirmed mine strikes (IMO, Middle East – Highlighted (Confirmed) Incidents, 2026).

A burning tanker, damaged engine room, or reported explosion cannot establish the detonation mechanism on its own. Determining whether a mine was responsible would ordinarily require technical evidence, potentially including damage analysis, recovered components, underwater investigation, and reliable information about the vessel's position. Public reporting on the November allegations does not resolve those questions for every incident.

2. Can Naval Mines Lawfully Be Laid in Hormuz?

Naval mines are not prohibited weapons in all circumstances. A State engaged in an armed conflict may employ them for legitimate military purposes, subject to the applicable rules governing methods and means of warfare. Protecting a naval base, restricting enemy warship movements, or denying an operational area to opposing naval forces may constitute military purposes. None automatically excuses foreseeable harm to civilian navigation.

The lawfulness of mining depends on the weapon's characteristics, where it is placed, the military purpose pursued, the risks to protected shipping, and the precautions taken. Mines that remain dangerous after breaking loose or losing control raise particular concerns. A minefield whose effects cannot be sufficiently limited may also conflict with the prohibition of indiscriminate attacks.

The Strait of Hormuz adds a separate navigational dimension. Its legal status as a strait used for international navigation is not displaced by the existence of an armed conflict. Iran and Oman exercise sovereignty in their respective territorial waters, but coastal sovereignty must be considered alongside the rights of foreign ships under the applicable law of the sea and the rules governing naval warfare.

The legal status of the Strait of Hormuz involves distinctions between territorial sovereignty, jurisdiction, navigation rights, and the practical capacity to obstruct shipping. In the present context, the narrower issue is whether a particular mine deployment complies with the legal restrictions on naval warfare and passage.

3. Hague Convention VIII and the Rules on Naval Mines

The Convention (VIII) relative to the Laying of Automatic Submarine Contact Mines, adopted at The Hague on October 18, 1907, remains a principal historical instrument governing naval mining. It was negotiated to restrict dangers posed by automatic contact mines to ships that might encounter them during or after military operations.

The Convention did not prohibit all mines. It addressed particular mine designs, restrictions on their employment, precautions for merchant shipping, notifications, and removal after war. Its provisions must be read according to their actual wording, rather than treated as a comprehensive modern code covering every type of underwater explosive weapon.

Its importance extends beyond its direct treaty operation. The International Court of Justice has relied on the humanitarian principles underlying its provisions when assessing unnotified mining that endangered peaceful shipping. Those principles may apply through customary international law even where the Convention itself does not govern the States concerned.

3.1 Which Naval Mines Does the Convention Restrict?

Article 1 of Hague Convention VIII prohibits laying unanchored automatic contact mines unless they are designed to become harmless no more than one hour after the person who laid them ceases to control them. It also prohibits anchored automatic contact mines that do not become harmless when they break free from their moorings.

The same article addresses torpedoes that fail to become harmless after missing their target. These technical requirements reflect the danger that certain weapons can remain lethal outside the intended military operation. A drifting mine may travel into commercial shipping lanes, creating risks unrelated to the original target or military objective.

The Convention's original scope does not encompass every modern naval mine in identical terms. Contemporary influence mines may respond to magnetic, acoustic, pressure, or other signatures rather than direct physical contact. Their legality must be assessed through the rules specifically applicable to them, together with the broader obligations governing distinction, precautions, and the limitation of indiscriminate effects.

3.2 Warnings and the Protection of Commercial Shipping

Article 2 prohibits laying automatic contact mines off enemy coasts and ports when the sole purpose is intercepting commercial shipping. The wording is narrower than a general ban on any minefield that could affect merchant vessels. The purpose of the operation remains legally relevant, alongside the other applicable restrictions.

Article 3 requires precautions for the security of peaceful shipping when anchored automatic contact mines are employed. It also addresses rendering mines harmless within a limited period and giving notice of danger zones when the mines cease to be under surveillance, as soon as military exigencies permit.

These provisions recognize that concealment may be militarily valuable but can expose civilian shipping to grave danger. A warning's legal adequacy depends on the rule being applied and the circumstances of the operation. The Convention does not establish the same unconditional advance-notification formula for every type of mine deployment.

The customary-law importance of warning obligations is particularly clear in the International Court of Justice's Military and Paramilitary Activities in and against Nicaragua judgment of 1986. The Court treated the failure to notify shipping of mines in waters where foreign vessels enjoyed passage rights as a breach of humanitarian principles underlying Hague Convention VIII (ICJ, 1986, para. 215).

3.3 Iran's Treaty Status and Customary Obligations

Iran signed Hague Convention VIII in 1907 but did not become a contracting party through ratification, according to the treaty-participation record maintained by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Signature alone does not establish that Iran is bound by the Convention's substantive provisions as treaty obligations.

Article 7 introduces a further limitation: the Convention applies between contracting powers only when all belligerents are parties. Its treaty rules cannot be applied automatically to Iran merely because they address the type of conduct now alleged.

That limitation does not eliminate other legal obligations. Customary international humanitarian law can bind States independently of their participation in a particular treaty. The judicial recognition of humanitarian duties concerning maritime dangers and warnings is especially important, although it does not establish that every technical requirement of the 1907 Convention has become customary law.

The earlier Larak Island strike in August 2026 raised related questions about the anticipated deployment of naval mines. The November tanker reports concern a different issue: the legal consequences if mines were actually deployed in waters used by commercial shipping.

4. Naval Mining Under Contemporary Warfare Rules

The 1994 San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea provides a more developed treatment of naval mines. Prepared by an international group of experts, it is an influential statement of the law of naval warfare but not a treaty. Its individual formulations must not all be assumed to possess identical customary-law status.

Paragraph 80 states that mines may be used for legitimate military purposes, including denying sea areas to an enemy. Paragraphs 81 and 82 address the need for mines to become harmless when control is lost and impose particular restrictions on free-floating mines. These provisions reflect the concern that naval weapons should not continue threatening vessels after their intended military function has ended.

Paragraphs 83 and 84 address notification and the recording of mine locations. The Manual distinguishes mines capable of detonating only against military objectives from devices that may threaten other vessels. That distinction is operationally important: a mine designed to discriminate reliably between targets presents a different legal risk from one that can detonate against ordinary commercial traffic.

The governing rules of international humanitarian law extend beyond mine design. Attacks must be directed against military objectives, and parties must take feasible precautions to avoid or minimize incidental civilian harm. They may not launch attacks expected to cause incidental harm excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated. The application of these rules to a minefield requires attention to its likely effects over time and across the area in which vessels may encounter it.

A State cannot make an indiscriminate method lawful simply by announcing that shipping should avoid a particular zone. Warnings may reduce risk and form part of required precautions, but they do not independently establish the legality of a weapon, target, or military operation. Similar distinctions arise throughout the law governing the use of force and conduct of hostilities in the U.S.–Iran war.

5. Strait of Hormuz Mines and International Passage

The Strait of Hormuz connects the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman and serves international navigation. Its significance does not derive solely from commercial traffic volumes. The applicable rules recognize rights of passage that constrain the powers coastal States may exercise over ships using the strait.

Naval mining engages two bodies of law that must be considered together. The law of the sea addresses navigational rights and coastal-State authority, while the law of armed conflict governs the employment of military force and weapons during hostilities. Neither can be used without qualification to dismiss the other.

The main difficulty is that the relevant treaty commitments differ. UNCLOS binds Oman as a party, whereas Iran is not a party and has challenged aspects of the Convention's transit-passage regime. The legal consequences for Iran require separate examination of customary law, established maritime passage rights, and the rules governing armed conflict.

5.1 Transit Passage Under UNCLOS

Part III of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea regulates passage through straits used for international navigation. Article 38 establishes the right of transit passage in qualifying straits. Article 44 requires States bordering such straits not to hamper transit passage and provides that it may not be suspended.

The Convention preserves coastal-State sovereignty over territorial waters while limiting how that sovereignty may be exercised against international navigation. Its provisions permit certain regulations relating to passage, but Article 42 prevents those rules from having the practical effect of denying, hampering, or impairing transit passage.

For Oman, these treaty obligations are directly relevant. They also form part of the wider international legal argument against obstructing the waterway. Their precise application to Iran cannot, however, be established simply by citing UNCLOS as though Iran had ratified it.

5.2 Iran's Objection to Customary Transit Passage

Iran signed UNCLOS in 1982 without subsequently ratifying it. Its position has been that certain provisions of the Convention emerged from negotiated compromises and do not necessarily reflect pre-existing customary international law. Tehran has specifically resisted the proposition that the complete treaty regime of transit passage binds it through custom.

In a statement delivered at the United Nations on June 18, 2026, Iran reiterated its position that the Strait of Hormuz is subject to innocent passage rather than the broader transit-passage regime and invoked its asserted status as a persistent objector. These are Iranian legal claims, not findings conclusively establishing the limits of customary law.

Persistent objection is a doctrine concerning a State's opposition to a rule during its formation. Its applicability depends on the history of the alleged rule and the consistency and legal significance of the objection. Iran's assertion does not itself prove that all other States must accept its preferred regime, nor does disagreement over transit passage extinguish established obligations concerning peaceful navigation and the protection of shipping.

The separate question of Iran's claimed closure of the Strait of Hormuz concerns the scope of its coastal authority. Naval mining presents an additional problem because explosive devices may endanger vessels regardless of whether those vessels are subject to a lawful navigational restriction.

5.3 Wartime Mining and Safe Alternative Routes

The San Remo Manual states in paragraph 27 that the rights of transit passage applicable in peacetime continue during armed conflict. Paragraph 89 addresses mining that would impede passage through international straits, contemplating safe and convenient alternative routes. These provisions are relevant expert formulations, but the Manual does not amend UNCLOS or independently settle the customary obligations of nonparties.

The adequacy of an alternative route cannot be judged by its designation alone. Its safety, navigational characteristics, accessibility, and practical suitability for the affected vessels are material. A channel exposed to comparable hazards may not offer a meaningful alternative to the route it is supposed to replace.

The IMO coordinated an emergency evacuation arrangement for vessels stranded in the Gulf during June 23–26, 2026. It provided for northern and southern routing options through Iranian and Omani waters, respectively, with coastal-State coordination and operational instructions. The arrangement was subsequently paused. Its temporary humanitarian function did not, by itself, confer a general right on either coastal State to impose otherwise unlawful restrictions on international shipping.

6. Can Iran Attack Tankers Using Unauthorized Routes?

A commercial ship does not automatically become a military objective because it uses a route that a belligerent State has described as unauthorized. International humanitarian law distinguishes the regulation of maritime movement from the circumstances permitting an attack against a vessel.

That distinction is central to the Iranian explanations of the reported tanker incidents. If a ship breached a legally applicable traffic direction, the breach would require assessment under the relevant navigational or wartime rules. It would not alone establish that destroying or damaging the ship was lawful.

The position also depends on the vessel's nationality and conduct. Enemy merchant vessels and neutral merchant vessels are subject to different rules concerning attack, capture, visit, and search. A legal assessment cannot assume that every unidentified tanker falls into the same category.

6.1 Military Objectives and Neutral Merchant Vessels

The San Remo Manual provides in paragraph 59 that enemy merchant vessels may be attacked only when they qualify as military objectives. Paragraph 60 identifies activities that may establish such a status, including direct participation in belligerent acts, service as a military auxiliary, certain intelligence activities, or resistance to lawful military control in specified circumstances.

Neutral merchant vessels receive particular protection. Paragraph 67 identifies narrower circumstances in which they may be attacked, including certain forms of assistance to an enemy's military operations and specified conduct involving blockade enforcement, visit, search, or capture. These exceptions require the relevant factual conditions; they cannot be inferred from the mere presence of a neutral tanker in a contested sea area.

The analysis must also distinguish a deliberate attack directed against a specific merchant ship from the consequences of laying a minefield. In the first situation, the vessel's status and conduct are central to identifying a lawful target. In the second, the minefield's purpose, placement, predictability, and effects on civilian shipping become particularly important. Both situations remain subject to applicable rules on precautions and civilian protection.

6.2 Disabled AIS and Alleged Navigation Violations

The Automatic Identification System (AIS) helps vessels and maritime authorities exchange navigational information. Its use is regulated through international maritime safety requirements, but a failure to transmit AIS data is not equivalent to participation in hostilities.

The IMO's revised operational guidelines, adopted through Resolution A.1106(29), recognize circumstances in which a ship's master may switch off AIS when continued transmission would compromise the vessel's safety or security. Such decisions are subject to the applicable requirements and should not be treated as a general exemption from navigational duties.

Equally, a ship transmitting no AIS signal cannot be classified as a military objective on that fact alone. Its conduct may justify further identification or inquiry, depending on the circumstances, but the legal conditions for attack remain separate. Allegations of unauthorized routing or disabled AIS cannot substitute for evidence of military use or other conduct recognized by the law of naval warfare.

7. ICJ Precedents on Mines and Maritime Responsibility

The International Court of Justice has addressed naval mines in disputes involving maritime sovereignty, warning duties, attribution, and the protection of navigation. Three judgments are especially relevant to the present controversy, although none determines responsibility for the November 2026 incidents.

In Corfu Channel (United Kingdom v. Albania), the Court's 1949 judgment arose from explosions that damaged British warships in Albanian territorial waters. The Court did not establish that Albania had laid the mines. It found responsibility based on Albania's knowledge of the minefield and failure to warn ships of the danger, while separately finding that a subsequent British minesweeping operation violated Albanian sovereignty (ICJ, 1949).

The judgment recognized elementary considerations of humanity and duties associated with known maritime hazards. Its facts arose in peacetime, which limits any attempt to apply the decision as a complete code for wartime mining. Its reasoning nevertheless remains important when considering whether a State knew of a dangerous minefield and failed to give appropriate warning.

In Military and Paramilitary Activities in and against Nicaragua (Nicaragua v. United States of America), the Court examined the mining of Nicaraguan ports during the 1980s. It found that the United States had laid mines and failed to provide public warnings. The Court connected that failure with humanitarian principles underlying Hague Convention VIII and the rights of navigation and maritime commerce (ICJ, 1986, paras. 214–215).

The Oil Platforms judgment of 2003 is important for a different reason. The Court examined evidence concerning a mine that struck USS Samuel B. Roberts during the Iran–Iraq War. Although the material suggested Iranian involvement, the Court did not treat it as conclusive proof that Iran had laid the particular mine. The judgment illustrates the evidentiary difficulties of attributing an underwater explosion to a State (ICJ, 2003, para. 71).

These precedents establish neither that Iran laid the mines alleged in November 2026 nor that any particular tanker was lawfully or unlawfully attacked. They identify legal questions that must be answered through evidence: who acted, what danger was created, what was known, which precautions were required, and whether an applicable international obligation was breached. The Corfu Channel case is especially instructive because knowledge of a dangerous minefield and responsibility for laying it are legally distinct.

8. Neutral Waters, Responsibility, and Mine Clearance

The location of a naval mine may be decisive. Territorial waters belonging to a State not party to an armed conflict raise different legal issues from waters under the sovereignty of a belligerent. A report locating an attack generally within the Strait of Hormuz is not sufficient to determine which State's territorial waters were involved.

The San Remo Manual describes neutral waters as including the internal waters and territorial sea of neutral States. Paragraph 86 states that belligerents may not mine neutral waters. This reflects the protection afforded to States outside a conflict, although the application of the rule requires an accurate determination of the waters concerned and the relevant State's legal position.

Oman has publicly described its cooperation over the Strait of Hormuz as neutral and has reaffirmed its UNCLOS obligations. At the same time, an October 2026 assessment by the International Institute for Strategic Studies reported allegations of limited logistical support to U.S. forces from Omani territory earlier in the conflict, which Oman had not publicly acknowledged. Those allegations do not establish that Oman became a belligerent. They do require care before treating a diplomatic declaration as a conclusive legal determination for every purpose of neutrality law.

Responsibility for a mine strike also depends on attribution. Evidence that a vessel encountered an explosive device does not necessarily establish which State deployed it. If a minefield is attributable to a State, further questions arise concerning the applicable legal rule, the circumstances of deployment, warnings, the vessel's status, and any resulting injury. Reparation may follow an internationally wrongful act, but neither liability nor the amount of compensation can be inferred from an explosion alone.

Unremoved mines present continuing navigational dangers. Article 5 of Hague Convention VIII addresses efforts by contracting powers to remove mines at the close of war. Because Iran is not a contracting party, that treaty provision cannot simply be imposed on it as a direct treaty obligation. The San Remo Manual, in paragraphs 90–92, separately addresses post-hostilities clearance efforts, cooperation, and assistance, but those formulations must be distinguished from independently binding rules.

The practical necessity of recording mine locations, communicating hazards, and making dangerous waters safe does not depend on resolving every legal controversy concerning clearance duties. Whether a particular State has breached an enforceable international obligation must still be established under the law applicable to its conduct. The protection of seafarers and restoration of safe navigation remain central concerns even where responsibility for individual devices has not yet been determined.

Conclusion

The reported tanker explosions in the Strait of Hormuz raise serious legal questions, but the available independent evidence does not establish that every incident described by Iranian authorities involved a naval mine. The identity of the weapon, its location, the vessel affected, and responsibility for its deployment remain essential to any judgment about a particular attack.

Naval mines are not categorically unlawful during armed conflict. Their employment is constrained by rules concerning legitimate military objectives, the protection of peaceful shipping, precautions against indiscriminate harm, navigational rights, and neutral waters. Hague Convention VIII provides important historical rules, while customary international law and the principles reflected in the San Remo Manual inform the contemporary assessment. Their different legal status must be preserved, particularly because Iran has not ratified the 1907 Convention or UNCLOS.

Iran's designation of shipping routes as unauthorized cannot, by itself, justify attacking commercial tankers or deploying mines without regard for their effects on foreign vessels. The decisive legal question is not simply whether a minefield served a military purpose, but whether its deployment and consequences complied with the obligations applicable to the State responsible.

References

Convention (VIII) relative to the Laying of Automatic Submarine Contact Mines (1907) Adopted at The Hague, 18 October 1907; entered into force 26 January 1910. Available at: https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hague08.asp (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Committee of the Red Cross (n.d.) Hague Convention (VIII) on Submarine Mines, 1907 – State Parties [online]. Available at: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/hague-conv-viii-1907/state-parties (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Court of Justice (1949) Corfu Channel (United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland v. Albania), Merits, Judgment of 9 April 1949, I.C.J. Reports 1949, p. 4. Available at: https://api.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/1/001-19490409-JUD-01-00-EN.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Court of Justice (1986) Military and Paramilitary Activities in and against Nicaragua (Nicaragua v. United States of America), Merits, Judgment of 27 June 1986, I.C.J. Reports 1986, p. 14. Available at: https://api.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/70/070-19860627-JUD-01-00-EN.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Court of Justice (2003) Oil Platforms (Islamic Republic of Iran v. United States of America), Judgment of 6 November 2003, I.C.J. Reports 2003, p. 161. Available at: https://api.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/90/090-20031106-JUD-01-00-EN.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Institute for Strategic Studies (2026) ‘The Gulf States and Iran: Past and Future Trajectories’, in The Gulf at War: Geopolitical, Defence and Geo-economic Dimensions. London: International Institute for Strategic Studies. Available at: https://www.iiss.org/globalassets/media-library---content--migration/files/publications---free-files/strategic-dossier/md-dossier-2026/iiss_the-gulf-at-war_chapter-one_30102026.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Institute of Humanitarian Law (1994) San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflicts at Sea. Adopted at San Remo, 12 June 1994. Available at: https://onlinelibrary.iihl.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/14_SAN-REMO-EN.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Maritime Organization (2015) Revised Guidelines for the Onboard Operational Use of Shipborne Automatic Identification Systems (AIS), Resolution A.1106(29), adopted 2 December 2015, IMO document A 29/Res.1106, 14 December 2015. Available at: https://wwwcdn.imo.org/localresources/en/OurWork/Safety/Documents/AIS/Resolution%20A.1106(29).pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Maritime Organization (2026a) Middle East – Highlighted (Confirmed) Incidents [online]. Available at: https://www.imo.org/en/mediacentre/hottopics/pages/middle-east-highlighted-incidents.aspx (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

International Maritime Organization (2026b) Operational FAQs – IMO Strait of Hormuz Evacuation Plan [online]. Available at: https://www.imo.org/en/mediacentre/hottopics/pages/faqs-strait-of-hormuz-evacuation-plan.aspx (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

Islamic Republic of Iran (2026) Statement delivered at the United Nations concerning the regime of passage through the Strait of Hormuz, 18 June 2026 [online]. Available at: https://estatements.un.org/estatements/61.0130/20260618100000000/tEwRFnkPAjPI/pEBcwLYLPAztbtU_nyc_en.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

Joint Maritime Information Center (2026) Update 113 to JMIC Advisory Note: Regional Tension – Impact on Maritime Security, 12 November 2026. Available at: https://www.ukmto.org/-/media/ukmto/products/jmic_advisory_update_113_12-nov.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Sultanate of Oman (2026) Oman Reaffirms Cooperation to Restore Freedom of Navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, 14 July 2026 [online]. Available at: https://www.fm.gov.om/en/50942/ (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

Reuters (2026a) ‘Four tankers struck by explosions in Strait of Hormuz, Iran says’, 12 November 2026 [online]. Available at: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/two-oil-tankers-disabled-by-explosions-strait-hormuz-irgc-says-2026-11-12/ (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

Reuters (2026b) ‘Iran’s IRGC says two tankers hit sea mines in Hormuz’, 13 November 2026 [online]. Available at: https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/irans-irgc-says-two-tankers-hit-sea-mines-hormuz-2026-11-13/ (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (1982) Adopted at Montego Bay, 10 December 1982; entered into force 16 November 1994, 1833 UNTS 3. Available at: https://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/unclos_e.pdf (Accessed: 14 November 2026).

United Nations Treaty Collection (n.d.) United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea: Status of Participation, Chapter XXI, No. 6 [online]. Available at: https://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetailsIII.aspx?chapter=21&mtdsg_no=XXI-6&src=IND (Accessed: 14 November 2026).