The IMO Can Count the Attacks in Hormuz. It Cannot Stop Them.

IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez warned on Sunday that conditions for international shipping in the Strait of Hormuz "continue to be severe and critical," citing a "double blockade" and repeated attacks on vessels. His advice to the industry was to stop transiting the strait, or putting seafarers at risk, "until we have guarantees."

He did not say who would supply them.

The gap between what the International Maritime Organization can document and what it can enforce is the story. The agency has verified 80 attacks on merchant vessels in and around the strait since the current Middle East conflict began on February 28, resulting in at least 22 seafarer deaths.

Rescue operations have pulled 44 seafarers from three hijacked vessels — HONOUR 25, SEAMULL (SIBU 1) and EUREKA — in the Western Indian Ocean and Gulf of Aden region. Five seafarers were reportedly killed in the crossfire during the rescue of HONOUR 25.

Dominguez's warning followed an October 9 letter in which Iran alleged the US military used VHF Channel 16, an internationally designated maritime emergency radio channel, to threaten civilian crews.

The strait is a global energy and shipping chokepoint, so a sustained blockade plus verified attacks raises costs, delays and danger well beyond the region. But the IMO's tools are documentation and condemnation. Until some party with naval capacity — a state, a coalition, or the belligerents themselves — converts a guarantee into an enforceable arrangement, the agency's advice remains what it is: a warning that ships should not sail, and a count of what happens when they do.