News - Middle East - Iraq The Iraqi military says it has successfully dismantled a mine that was discovered stuck to the hull of an oil tanker in the Persian Gulf earlier this week.

n a statement carried by the media office of the Iraqi Joint Operations Command on Saturday, the military announced that explosives experts of the Interior Ministry had in cooperation with the Navy defused the mine.

It said Iraqi authorities have opened an investigation to find out the circumstances of the incident.

The mine was discovered on Thursday afternoon, when the tanker was in international waters - about 28 nautical miles (52 kilometers) off Iraq’s coast in the Persian Gulf - supplying another ship with fuel, according to a statement from the Iraqi government.

The Interior Ministry then formed an explosives-handling team that was airlifted to the affected oil tanker.

“Despite the height and intensity of wave movement, it was able to evacuate the other ship and keep the ship that showed a large marine mine attached,” the statement read.

The Iraqi government has not provided further details about the incident, but two private security firms said the discovery was likely a limpet mine on the MT Pola, a Liberian-flagged tanker.

A limpet mine is a type of naval mine that is usually manually placed by a swimmer, diver or frogman on the underside of a ship's hull.

It wasn’t immediately clear who may have placed the device on the oil tanker.

The discovery came amid heightened tensions between Iran and the US in the final days of President Donald Trump’s administration.

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif urged Trump on Saturday not to be “trapped” by an Israeli plan to provoke a war through subversive acts in Iraq.

Source: Press TV