Tehran announces it will allow UN inspectors aboard Yemen bound ship
Oklahoma City Sun Sunday 24th May, 2015
• Iran claims it is sending aid to Yemen but Saudi Arabia says it is transporting arms
• Iran supports the Houthi rebels fighting the central government
• Saudi and US ships have blockaded Yemen
YEHRAN, Iran - Over the past week, Saudi Arabian and US warships have been tracking the Iran Shahed, a 3,000-tonne Iranian cargo vessel purportedly loaded with humanitarian aid for Yemen.
The ship is making its way towards Yemen, escorted by two Revolutionary Guard destroyers, in a maritime standoff that analysts say is an attempt by Tehran to turn some of the public's conceptions about the proxy conflict.
Riyadh fears the Shahed is laden with arms to bolster Yemen's Houthi rebellion, drawing the Saudis and their allies deeper into a major conflict on its doorstep, but Tehran has announced that it will allow UN inspectors aboard the ship to examine her cargo.
The Shahed's voyage follows months of suspicious shipping activity between Iran and Yemen however, amid mounting claims from regional western diplomats and intelligence officials of Tehran's complicity in the Yemeni civil war.
At least four large cargo ships, with a combined capacity of more than 15,000 tonnes, have made a series of highly unusual and undeclared trips between Iran and Yemeni in the first few months of this year.
Each ship has only visited ports controlled by the Houthis.
Tehran has staunchly denied it has provided arms to Yemen but all four ships undertook voyages to transport cargo from the port of Bandar Abbas in Iran to Yemen's Houthi-controlled port of Hodeida and changed their ensigns and turned off their tracking devices at key points during their voyages.
The ship's also registered false information in international shipping logs and met unidentified craft mid-ocean.
Analysts say the shipping logs of the vessels suggest they're being operated by the state. In one example, a cargo ship a 7,000 tonne vessel more than 100m in length left Southeast Asia, and arrived arrived in Karachi, Pakistan in mid-January. In mid-February it appeared at Iran's Bandar Abbas and reappeared off the Yemeni coast, outside the Houthi-controlled port of Hodeida on February 23.
It remained anchored in Yemeni waters for a month, before heading back towards Iran. Analysts say such behaviour is neither logical or economical and suggests a nation and not a private company is paying for the ships.
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