Before the\u00a0U.S.-Iran conflict<\/a>\u00a0broke out on February 28 and disrupted Middle East crude oil and liquefied natural gas supplies, Japan relied on the region for 95% of its oil imports, much of it coming via the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n The move comes as Japan\u2019s recent diplomatic efforts to safeguard energy supplies were disrupted by the war.<\/p>\n Earlier in April, the Sohar\u00a0LNG\u00a0tanker co-owned by Japan\u2019s Mitsui O.S.K. Lines\u00a09104.T\u00a0and the Mitsui-owned LPG tanker\u00a08031.T, Green Sanvi,\u00a0crossed<\/a>\u00a0the strait.<\/p>\n Idemitsu Maru, a very large crude carrier (VLCC), is managed by a unit of Japanese refiner Idemitsu Kosan\u00a05019.T.<\/p>\n Idemitsu Kosan declined to comment on individual ships.<\/p>\n The vessel was 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) east of Larak Island and moving eastward with its Automatic Identification System active, separate data from MarineTraffic showed.<\/p>\n HORMUZ TRAFFIC STAYS MUTED<\/p>\n Between 125 and 140 ships crossed in and out of the strait daily before February 28, but only two had sailed in the past day, including a general cargo ship Gulf King that sailed from Iran\u2019s Bandar Abbas anchorage and the Axion I liquefied\u00a0petroleum\u00a0gas (LPG) tanker,\u00a0which is subject to US sanctions<\/a>, according to Kpler ship-tracking data and satellite analysis from SynMax.<\/p>\n An\u00a0LNG\u00a0tanker managed by UAE\u2019s ADNOC<\/a>\u00a0crossed Hormuz and was near India, ship-tracking data showed on Monday. If confirmed, it would be the first loaded\u00a0LNG\u00a0tanker to cross the strait since the war began. It was unclear when it sailed.<\/p>\n If Hormuz were to reopen by \u201ctomorrow, we suggest that it will take until at least September for tanker and oil markets to return to something resembling \u2018normal,’\u201d ship broker BRS said in a note this week.<\/p>\n U.S. President Donald Trump is unhappy with the latest Iranian proposal on resolving the two-month war, a U.S. official said,\u00a0dampening hopes<\/a>\u00a0for a resolution soon.<\/p>\n (Reporting by Katya Golubkova, Kentaro Okasaka, Kantaro Komiya and Mariko Katsumura in Tokyo, Florence Tan in Singapore and Jonathan Saul in LondonEditing by Bernadette Baum)<\/p>\n (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2026.<\/p>\n Editorial Standards<\/a> \u00b7 Corrections<\/a> \u00b7 About gCaptain<\/a><\/p>\n This article contains reporting from Reuters, published under license.<\/p>\n \t\t Sign up for gCaptain\u2019s newsletter and never miss an update<\/p>\n \u2014 trusted by our 106,506 members<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Katya Golubkova and Kantaro Komiya TOKYO, April 28 (Reuters)\u00a0\u2013\u00a0Panama-flagged tanker Idemitsu Maru, carrying 2 million barrels of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":87655,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[102,34,389,10851,101,6253],"class_list":{"0":"post-87654","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-strait-of-hormuz","8":"tag-hormuz","9":"tag-iran","10":"tag-japan","11":"tag-saudia-arabia","12":"tag-strait-of-hormuz","13":"tag-vlcc"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116482780887110215","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87654"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87654\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87655"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"logo\"\/](\"https:\/\/gcaptain.com\/wp-content\/themes\/gCaptain-Theme\/assets\/images\/gcaptain-new-gray-logo.svg\"){kind=logo}
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