LONDON, July 12 (Xinhua) -- British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt on Friday pledged to add more warships to the Royal Navy's fleet if he wins the Tory leadership race and becomes prime minister.
In an interview with local media, Hunt said Britain's response to rising tensions with Iran have been "measured" and "careful".
His pledge came as tensions are mounting in the Gulf after the British government said that a Royal Navy warship drove off Iranian patrol boats that were allegedly attempting to impede the progress of a British tanker sailing through the Strait of Hormuz.
An Iranian official has been quoted by international media as warning Britain not to get involved in "this dangerous game."
The police of Gibraltar, Britain's overseas territory, arrested on Thursday the captain and chief officer of an Iranian oil supertanker Grace 1, which was reportedly transporting Iranian crude oil to Syria.
British Marines and Gibraltar police intercepted the oil tanker on July 4 in the Strait of Gibraltar in the south of the Iberian Peninsula over alleged violation of the European Union's sanctions against Syria.
A spokesperson of Gibraltar police said the two men arrested were being investigated but have not been charged yet. Documents and electronic devices were also seized from the tanker.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday warned Britain of the "consequences" following the seizure of an Iranian oil tanker.
"I remind the Britons: you are the ones initiating insecurity, and you will come to realize its consequences in the future," Rouhani said in a cabinet meeting, quoted by Press TV.
Hunt has vowed to increase the UK's defense spending from 2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) to 2.5 percent and add more jets.
"When you look at this week's events it shows that over recent decades we have run down the Navy too much," Hunt wrote in the Daily Telegraph on Friday.
