The US Department of Justice has launched a property confiscation process, a senior US official revealed. However, the source did not explain in detail what this process includes, as well as whether it means that the US will confiscate crude oil on oil tankers.
US officials also declined to disclose the current route of these oil tankers for security reasons.
According to the Pentagon, US forces boarded 2 oil tankers Tifani and Phonix (also known as Majestic X) last week in the area near Sri Lanka. In the following days, these 2 ships continued to move across the Indian Ocean and seemed to have changed direction many times.
The US and Iran are imposing parallel blockades in and around the Strait of Hormuz, as President Donald Trump increases economic pressure on Iran, while Tehran seeks to respond to pressure from Washington.
The decision to implement naval blockade against Iran, announced on April 12, is an important part of the US "Operation Economic Fury" to tighten Iran's oil revenue and create leverage for nuclear negotiations.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has repeatedly stated that the blockade is preventing Iran from exporting oil, causing crude oil inventories to increase, forcing the country to close mines, thereby cutting revenue used to finance military forces and affiliated groups.
In an interview with Fox Business this week, Mr. Bessent said that Iran's Kharg Island is "almost completely stagnant in crude oil loading and unloading". "We believe Iran's storage facilities will soon be full. They will be forced to close oil wells, which will lead to long-term problems," he added.
In some cases, when the captains of ships tried to overcome US blockades, the US Navy forced the blocked ships to return to ports in the Persian Gulf. The seizure of oil on ships related to Iran would mark an escalation in the US economic pressure campaign, in line with the strategy that the US once applied to Venezuela.
At the end of February, the US Department of Justice filed a federal court in Washington DC requesting the confiscation of 1.8 million barrels of Venezuelan crude oil on a tanker linked to the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
The US Department of Justice uses the asset confiscation mechanism as a legal tool to seize assets suspected of being related to criminal activities, often through lawsuits directly targeting assets rather than individuals.
The US also implemented similar measures in 2023, when it requested an Iranian crude oil tanker en route to China to divert to the US. A year earlier, the US also ordered the confiscation of 4 Iranian gasoline tankers en route to Venezuela.
