A powerful council in Iran said on Saturday the country’s seizure of a British oil tanker in the strategic Strait of Hormuz was in response to London’s role in impounding an Iranian supertanker two weeks earlier. Spokesman of Iran’s Guardian Council, Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei, was quoted in the semi-official Fars news agency saying “the rule of reciprocal action is well-known in international law” and that Iran’s moves to “confront the illegitimate economic war and seizure of oil tankers is an instance of this rule and is based on international rights.” The British-flagged Stena Impero was seized by Iran on Friday evening. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it impounded the vessel for breaking “international maritime rules” in the strait. Iran denies drone shot down by US over Strait of Hormuz Two weeks earlier, Britain’s Royal Marines took part in the seizure of an Iranian oil tanker carrying more than 2 million barrels of Iranian crude by Gibraltar, a British overseas territory off the southern coast of Spain. Officials there initially said the July 4 seizure happened on orders from the US. Britain has said it would release the vessel if Iran could prove it was not breaching European Union sanctions on oil shipments to Syria. However, on Friday, a court in Gibraltar extended by 30 days the detention of the Panama-flagged Grace. Britain said Iran had seized two ships in the Gulf, and Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt warned of “serious consequences” if the issue was not resolved quickly. The British owner of the second tanker, the Liberian-flagged Mesdar, said the ship had been temporarily boarded by armed personnel, but was free to leave and that all crew were “safe and well”. Tensions in the Gulf have soared in recent weeks, with US President Donald Trump calling off air strikes against Iran at the last minute in June after the Islamic republic downed a US drone, and blaming Iran for a series of tanker attacks. Trump said Friday’s incident “only goes to show what I’m saying about Iran: trouble. Nothing but trouble.” The Stena Impero had been heading for Saudi Arabia on Friday when it collided with a fishing vessel, according to authorities at the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas, off which the tanker is now anchored. We’ll destroy any Iranian drones that fly ‘too close’ to our ships, US says The vessel had “collided with a fishing boat on its route and, according to law, after an accident it is necessary that the cause of the accident are investigated,” said Allah-Morad Afifipoor, director general of the Hormozgan province port and maritime authority. The Swedish-owned tanker “has 23 crew and they are all on the ship,” he said, quoted by Fars news agency. The Philippines said the crew was made up of 18 Indians, three Russians, a Latvian and a Filipino. Both Manila and New Delhi said they had contacted Tehran to seek their nationals’ release. Following the collision, those on board the fishing boat “contacted the British vessel but did not receive any response”, so they “informed the Hormozgan port and maritime office according to the legal procedures,” Afifipoor said. “The investigation into the cause of the accident has been started today by experts” from Hormozgan province’s port and maritime authority, he added. Tanker tracking service Marine Traffic showed the Stena Impero had last signalled its location near the island of Larak at 9:00pm (local time). The ship was transiting the Strait of Hormuz and in “international waters” when it was “attacked by unidentified small crafts and a helicopter,” the owner said. Hunt warned that “if this situation is not resolved quickly there will be serious consequences”. But he told Sky News that “we’re not looking at military options, we are looking at a diplomatic way to resolve the situation.” London on Saturday warned British ships to avoid the Hormuz Strait for “an interim period”. “We remain deeply concerned about Iran’s unacceptable actions which represent a clear challenge to international freedom of navigation,” a government spokeswoman said following an overnight meeting of the government’s COBRA emergencies committee. Germany and France urged Iran to release the tanker, whose seizure Berlin called a “dangerous further aggravation of an already tense situation”. “We call on Iranian authorities to quickly release the ship and its crew, and to respect freedom of navigation principles in the Gulf,” the French foreign ministry said. The latest incidents came as Trump and American officials insisted, despite denials from Tehran, that the US military had downed an Iranian drone that was threatening an American naval vessel in the Strait of Hormuz. Why Iran’s foreign minister isn’t allowed to freely roam New York Trump said the drone had been threatening the amphibious assault ship USS Boxer. Iran’s deputy foreign minister Abbas Araghchi tweeted that the Americans may have shot down a US drone by mistake, and the Revolutionary Guards later released footage they said belies the US claims. The seven-minute video, apparently shot from high altitude, shows a convoy of ships the Guards said they were tracking as they passed through the strait. The ships in the footage could not be immediately identified, although one appears similar to the USS Boxer. As tensions soared, Tehran’s arch rival Saudi Arabia said it would once again host US troops on its soil to boost regional security. Trump dumped Iran deal to spite Obama, leaked UK cables suggest The Pentagon said the deployment “ensures our ability to defend our forces and interests in the region from emergent, credible threats.” The US military also said it had patrol aircraft monitoring the Strait of Hormuz, and was developing a “multinational maritime effort” to ensure freedom of navigation in key Middle East waterways. The escalation comes more than a year after Washington unilaterally withdrew from the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement and began ratcheting up sanctions against Tehran. Earlier this month, Iran exceeded the deal’s caps on uranium enrichment, aiming to pressure the remaining parties to make good on their promises to help prop up its economy. The Islamic republic has repeatedly threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz if attacked. Additional reporting by Reuters and Associated Press