As US and Iran weigh peace deal, stranded seafarers wait in limbo

Stranded at an Iranian port for nearly 10 weeks, Indian seafarer Anish has unintentionally become a firsthand witness to the Iran war.

Anish arrived in the Shatt al-Arab waterway on a cargo ship days before United States President Donald Trump launched “Operation Epic Fury” on February 28.

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He has been stuck on the vessel ever since.

“We’ve faced the whole situation here, the war, the missiles,” Anish, who was granted a pseudonym after agreeing to speak on condition of anonymity, told Al Jazeera.

“Our minds are terribly distracted.”

Some of his fellow Indian seafarers have been able to return home by crossing Iran’s 44km land border with Armenia, Anish said, but many others have remained because they are still waiting to get paid.

“Some are stuck because of their Indian agents; they are not getting their salaries,” Anish said, referring to the middlemen who recruit seafarers, manage payrolls and take care of other employee matters on behalf of shipping firms.

“Some are stuck because the Iranian agents say we will not give you the dollars to reach Armenia.”

Anish said he has been subsisting on a diet of potatoes, onions, tomatoes and flatbread, but has heard that food and water on other ships are running low.

Anish’s predicament is one faced by an estimated 20,000 seafarers stranded since Iran in effect shut the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for the United States and Israel’s attacks on the country.

Before the war, the strait functioned as one of the world’s most critical shipping routes, carrying about one-fifth of global oil and gas supplies, and one-third of the seaborne fertiliser trade.

Despite the announcement of a tenuous ceasefire between Washington and Tehran on April 7, maritime traffic has remained at a standstill amid recurrent attacks in and around the waterway.

US Central Command said on Thursday that it had “intercepted” and “eliminated” inbound Iranian threats after three US Navy guided-missile destroyers came under attack from missiles, drones and small boats while crossing the strait.

Iran’s military said it had retaliated against the US Navy vessels after US forces targeted an oil tanker in its territorial waters.

Tehran also accused Washington of violating their ceasefire by carrying out air strikes on civilian areas, including Qeshm Island.

Throughout the war, Iran has offered ships safe passage through its territorial waters for a fee, while continuing to fire intermittently on commercial vessels.

At the same time, the US has blockaded Iranian ports since April 13 in a bid to disrupt Tehran’s oil exports and access to foreign currency.

UK-based maritime intelligence company Lloyd’s List said on Monday that at least four commercial ships were fired upon since the previous day, while a container ship operated by French company CMA CGM on Wednesday reported that it had come under attack while crossing the waterway.

The United Nations International Maritime Organization estimates that at least 10 seafarers have been killed since the start of the war.

Iran’s merchant marine union reported that at least 44 Iranian seafarers, including dockworkers and fishermen, had been killed as of April 1.

Trump said on Wednesday that US officials held “very good talks” with Tehran and that a peace deal was “very possible”, but it remains unclear how close the sides are to any agreement.

While some ships have managed to exit the Strait of Hormuz during brief lulls in hostilities, each day brings new uncertainty for the civilian crews manning the Gulf’s massive fleet of oil, gas and container ships, according to labour groups.

Last month, Iranian forces detained two foreign-flagged cargo ships and their crew, while the US Navy captured three Iran-linked commercial vessels in the Gulf and the Indian Ocean.

The prospect of being detained on top of being stranded at sea has created an “enhanced state of fear,” said Stephen Cotton, general secretary of the International Transport Workers’ Federation, which represents about 700 unions across 150 countries.

“Since the beginning of the year, we’ve got military forces boarding ships like it’s the 17th century, and that’s terrifying,” Cotton told Al Jazeera.

“It’s kind of crazy, because these are seafarers. These are just workers.”

The IMO has called the situation facing mariners an “unprecedented” humanitarian crisis, though conditions facing workers can vary considerably depending on the shipowner and whether they are unionised.

While seafarers on board vessels operated by major international shipping lines have been receiving hazard pay and other assistance, some seafarers working with smaller operations are struggling to get paid or have their basic needs met, according to Cotton and other seafarers’ advocates.

“The reality is you’ve got two kinds of shipping industries. One is the intercontinental trade – the big gas, the big oil, and the big containers. Then you’ve got the local trade supplying oil, food, water and moving it around the Gulf,” Cotton said, adding that smaller vessels often operate without unions or the “rigorous enforcement of international regulations”.

Saman Rezaei, general secretary of the ITF-affiliated Iranian Merchant Mariners Syndicate, said that many foreign seafarers in Iran work for “irregular agencies” that do not meet international standards.

Crew rotation has become a major pressure point for ships.

Under the 2006 Maritime Labour Convention – an international treaty ratified by 111 countries, including China, India, Japan, Australia, and the United Kingdom – the maximum time a seafarer can be required to serve on board is 12 months.

While seafarers have a legal right to leave their vessel beyond this period, unstable conditions have made repatriation a complicated and expensive prospect.

In some cases, especially on board large cargo ships still at sea, departing crew must first be replaced by incoming employees for safety reasons.

“With the ships unable to move and flights disrupted, many have had no choice but to remain on the ships even after their planned rotation,” John Bradford, a former US Navy officer and executive director of the Yokosuka Council on Asia-Pacific Studies in Japan, told Al Jazeera.

“This keeps them from their families and creates all sorts of social ripple effects even as they continue in a situation that is increasingly stressful.”

‘I told my crew how to run’

Steven Jones, the founder of the “Seafarer Happiness Index,” said seafarers’ self-reported wellbeing score has fallen about 5 percent during the war.

Seafarers have described seeing Iranian drones and missiles flying at low altitude, Jones said.

“One told us: ‘What scares me the most is the thought of an intercepted drone or missile falling on us,’” Jones, who is affiliated with the UK-based Mission to Seafarers charity, told Al Jazeera.

Other seafarers have reported dwindling food supplies and preparing escape plans, Jones said.

“Several senior officers say they have had to prepare evacuation plans for their teams: ‘I told my crew how to run, where to jump from, and what to carry if something happens,’” Jones said, quoting one seafarer.

Earlier this week, Trump announced that the US would begin guiding stranded ships out of the strait from Monday, before suspending the operation less than 48 hours later to pursue peace talks despite ongoing attacks in the waterway.

Even if the strait were to reopen tomorrow, trade flows would take some time to return to normal due to damaged regional infrastructure, maxed-out storage facilities across the Gulf and a backlog of exports, according to shipping and logistics experts.

For the stranded seafarers, there is also the question of finding a safe route out of the strait, where Iran has reportedly laid sea mines.

US officials told The New York Times last month that Tehran had laid the mines haphazardly and was unable to locate all of them.

“There has been a lot of speculation about more precise numbers, but the fact is that we don’t know; uncertainty is central to mine warfare, and creating uncertainty about risk is part of the point of conducting it,” Scott Savitz, a senior engineer at the US-based Rand Corporation who has studied naval mine warfare, told Al Jazeera.

Savitz said that it would be possible to establish an exit corridor in a few days, but clearing the strait of mines could take weeks or even months.

“Iran has stated that it has laid mines in and around the Strait of Hormuz, but it’s possible that they have laid them in other areas,” Savitz said.

The IMO announced in late April that it was working on an evacuation plan that prioritises ships based on humanitarian need, but that “all parties” involved in the conflict would need to refrain from attacks for such an operation to proceed.

“It’s a very dangerous moment,” the ITF’s Cotton said.

“We’re all saying the same – don’t transit unless you know it’s safe – but I don’t think anyone really knows what’s safe any more.”

The longer the war drags on, the higher the risk that ship operators will abandon their vessels without settling all outstanding pay, according to seafarers’ advocates.

“This is a longstanding problem in the region, and as cargo disputes arise or the mechanical condition of vessels deteriorate, then the temptation for ‘bad owners’ is to walk away,” Jones said.

Anish, the Indian seafarer, said he has not been paid by his Dubai-based agent for nine months.

He is supposed to receive a payment in US dollars later this month, but he is worried that his company may withhold the sum.

“My contract finish date is the 20th of May,” Anish said.

“Maybe the company will provide my salary after that,” he said. “I don’t know ”