Shipping traffic through Hormuz still largely halted

LONDON - Shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remained broadly halted on Tuesday with only three ships passing the waterway in the past 24 hours, shipping data showed.

A U.S. blockade of Iranian ports has infuriated Tehran, prompting it to maintain its own restrictions on the strait, which had been typically handling roughly one-fifth of the world's oil and liquefied natural gas supply.

The Ean Spir products tanker sailed through Hormuz on Tuesday after previously calling at an Iraqi port, ship tracking data on the MarineTraffic platform showed.

The Lianstar cargo ship also sailed through the strait from an Iranian port, the data showed.

Separately, the Meda liquefied petroleum gas tanker crossed the strait on Monday in its second attempt to leave the Gulf after turning back previously, according to satellite analysis from data analytics specialists SynMax.

Those are a fraction of the 140 ships that sailed through daily before the U.S. and Israel's war on Iran began on February 28.

More than a dozen tankers passed through the strait after Iran briefly declared it open on Friday. But a ceasefire between the U.S. and Iran appeared in jeopardy on Tuesday as Iran vowed to retaliate for the U.S. seizure of one of its vessels and refused to join new peace talks.

Iran's army said an Iranian tanker had entered its territorial waters from the Arabian Sea on Monday with help from the Iranian Navy, despite what it described as repeated warnings and threats from the U.S. naval task force.

- Jonathan Saul; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne/Reuters