Iran opened fire in the Strait of Ormuz. Commercial ships turned back in the middle of the night

Iranian armed forces fired on Wednesday night on Thursday four merchant ships attempting to defeat the Ormuz Strait without Tehran's permission. Warnings were ignored – shots fired. All units have turned around.

Shots fired at dawn. Iran continues

The incident occurred on 27 May at about 0.35 local time, or 22.35 Polish time. Four merchant ships headed towards the Gulf did not follow Iran's notification procedure. After a series of warnings issued by the Iranian armed forces, the situation quickly escalated. As the ships continued voyage,Shots fired..

The units have turned around. According to the State-owned IRIB, neither the types of ships nor the flags under which they sailed were given. It is also unclear whether any of them suffered damage.

This isn't the first such incident. From the beginning of the war, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) was to carry out at least 21 confirmed attacks on commercial units in the area. Tehran speaks plainly: the blockade continues

Tehran says plainly: without agreement there will be no free passage through the Strait of Ormuz. Iran today treats this trail not only as an element of its own security, but also as a tool of pressure on the United States and their allies.

According to the Iranian side, the blockade is to apply until a final agreement is reached to end the conflict which broke out after the US-Israeli raids carried out at the end of February. The bombings killed Iran's highest leader Ali Chamenei.

The Ormuz Strait – only 33 nautical miles wide in the narrowest place – is the strategic throat of world energy trade. This water passes from 20 to 33 percent of the global transport of offshore oil and a significant proportion of the supply of liquefied natural gas. It's the only sea road to export raw materials from Iran, Saudi Arabia,United Arab EmiratesArabic, Kuwait and Iraq.

What this means for Poland and the market

The night fire is not an incident, it's a signal. Iran consistently treats the Strait as an instrument of emphasis – each subsequent shot towards a commercial unit immediately translates into listing forward contracts on these raw materials and shipowners' decisions to change to alternative routes.

For Poland this is not a distant conflict. For months, Polish companies importing raw materials, fertilizers and LNG have been experiencing the effects of the crisis in the form of higher insurance premiums and more expensive freight. The Ormuz Strait lies thousands of kilometres from Gdańsk and Świnoujście, but every escalation in this area quickly translates into sea transport costs, raw materials prices and the operation of global supply chains.

Yes, negotiations are ongoing, Trump announces a breakthrough, and Tehran sends out a call sign. However, the nighttime fire of four merchant ships shows that we are still far from sustainable stabilisation. On one of the most important shipping routes in the world, it is still enough to have shipowners, insurers and the market recalculate risks.