MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/. More than 40 merchant ships crossed the Strait of Hormuz over the weekend, including a record 37 on Saturday, according to TASS calculations based on data from monitoring systems tracking the movement of maritime transport.
On April 18, 37 vessels crossed the Strait of Hormuz, a record since the escalation of the conflict in the region began. The previous record was 16 crossings on April 14. On April 19, before the announcement of the resumption of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, eight vessels managed to cross it.
Earlier, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi announced the opening of the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping. US President Donald Trump stated that Washington would continue the naval blockade of the Islamic Republic until a final agreement was reached. Subsequently, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC, the elite unit of the Iranian Armed Forces) Navy said that Iran had closed the strait until the US naval blockade was fully lifted. The IRGC called on shipowners to adhere exclusively to the recommendations of the Iranian side and described Trump’s statements about the situation in the Strait of Hormuz as not credible.
