Iran said on Monday it has sold a cargo of 2.1m barrels of crude oil carried on a tanker pursued by US authorities, Reuters reported, citing an Iranian government spokesman.
The official did not identify the cargo's new owner.
The crude is carried on the 300,600-dwt Adrian Darya 1 (built 1997), formerly known as Grace 1, which UK authorities arrested in Gibraltar on 4 July over suspicions it would sell its cargo to Syria.
Britain released the ship last week after receiving assurances the Adrian Darya 1 would not show up in the war-torn Middle Eastern country. The US administration, however, has been pushing nearby states to re-arrest the ship, claiming it is connected to the Revolutionary Guards, an Iranian elite military unit which Washington considers a terrorist organization but the European Union (EU) does not.
Since its release, the Adrian Darya 1 has been underway in the Mediterranean. It initially signalled it was sailing towards Greece and later Turkey, according to IAS data, but it later cancelled any information about its intended destination.
In an apparent reprisal to the arrest of the Grace 1 in Gibraltar, Iran seized on 19 July the UK-flagged 50,000-dwt tanker Stena Imperio (built 2018).
Last week, Stena Bulk chief executive Erik Hanell personally asked Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif to release the ship, which is still in Bandar Abbas.
Zarif paid an unannounced visit Sunday at the G7 summit of the leaders of the world's seven biggest economies, held in France.
