AFP, Ankara

A second Turkish-flagged ship has crossed the war-torn Strait of Hormuz, Turkey’s Transport Minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu said yesterday.

Iran has closed the Strait of Hormuz, a key global waterway, since the US-Israeli strikes on Iran started on February 28 set off the Middle East conflict and sent global oil and gas prices soaring.

Uraloglu said that on February 28 there were 15 ships belonging to Turkish shipowners waiting to go through the strategic strait.

“Two of these 15 made the crossing,” he told the private CNN Turk channel. “This is explained by our initiatives and also by the fact that they were using Iranian ports or carrying goods coming from or bound for Iran”.

Uraloglu did not say when the second ship crossed the strait. The first vessel had passed through, with Iranian permission, on March 13.

The two ships are the Rozana and Neraki, according to CNN Turk.

The minister said only nine of the blocked ships had sought permission to pass through the strait and that the transport and foreign ministries was trying to help them.

“Four of them have not requested to leave. Two of them are power-generation vessels and are stationed on site. The other two are waiting for the situation to calm down,” he added.