IFP - Four vessels with 16 crew members that had illegally entered the Iranian waters have been apprehended and handed over to officials.�



General Abdollah Nazarpour, a local border commander, says Iranian coastguards have intercepted four suspected fishing boats in the country�s territorial waters off the southern province of Khuzestan.

�The four illegal vessels were seized in the waters in the north of the Persian Gulf near Abadan, and their 16 crew members were arrested,� he said on Saturday.

�Yesterday [Friday], [coast] guards with the Abadan flotilla who were patrolling Iran�s territorial waters grew suspicious of four fishing vessels and intercepted them for further investigation,� he said, a Farsi report by IRNA said.

According to the investigations, he said, the four vessels belong to a foreign country and had entered Iranian waters without legal permission.

�They were stopped by the coastguards of Abadan, and their 16 crew members were arrested as border trespassers and handed over to legal authorities,� he noted.