British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has announced the launch of a crackdown on the so-called "shadow fleet" of Russian oil tankers used to circumvent international sanctions. According to him, 44 European states approved this plan at a meeting of the European Political Community, which took place in the UK the day before. This was reported by UNN with reference to Bloomberg.
Details
A Downing Street statement released on Thursday said that a joint "call to action" aimed at destroying the fleet of about 600 ships. According to Western countries, this is the number of ships used by Moscow to transport approximately 1.7 million barrels of oil per day.
The UK government also announced the imposition of sanctions on 11 tankers that it believes are used to transport Russian oil.
"Together with our European partners, we have sent a clear message to those who support Putin's attempts to circumvent sanctions: we will not allow Russia's shadowy fleet and the dirty money it generates to flow freely through European waters and put our security at risk," Starmer said.
росія вигадала нову схему обходу санкцій для торгівлі нафтою - Єрмак 19.07.24, 13:36
The UK statement says that the oil tanker fleet is being used to finance the Russian military machine in Ukraine. Some of the vessels are also said to be serving as Russian listening posts and transporting weapons to Russia.
Addendum
The newspaper reports that 8 of the 11 tankers under British sanctions belong to the Russian state-owned tanker business Sovcomflot, and the other three "have signs of shadow fleet vessels.