In the English Channel, less than two hours by fishing boat from Dover, some of the most potent weapons in Russia’s war on Ukraine are hiding in plain sight.
On a misty February morning midway between Britain and France, we watch tankers carrying Russian oil worth around $100m (£74.1m) cruise past in defiance of Western sanctions, embargoes, and price caps.
Dozens of these vessels pass through the Channel every month, part of a “shadow fleet” of up to 800 vessels that have kept the oil revenues that fund the war on Ukraine flowing.
This week, the UK government announced fresh sanctions against the Russian oil trade but the evidence of a day on the water is that the shadow fleet operates with apparent impunity, right under the nose of Kyiv’s allies.
Russian tankers a ‘routine sight’
Our skipper, Matt Coker, usually takes sea fishing parties out on the Portia, but we were after a bigger catch; three vessels in the shadow fleet carrying oil from Russia’s Baltic ports.
He says they are a routine sight in the world’s busiest shipping lane: “When you see these Russian ships and these oil tankers, you know, it’s a regular occurrence. To be honest, no one really takes any notice.”
We had tracked the tankers – the Rigel, the Hyperion and the Kousai – from the Gulf of Finland, where they had been loaded with oil at Russian Baltic ports, to intercept them as they passed the narrowest point of the Dover Straits.
Up close in a rising swell, the scale of the vessels is unavoidable, and each one tells a story about both the impact and the limits of Western action.
The Rigel, a Suezmax-class tanker, is more than 270 metres long and fills the near horizon as it emerges from the mist. With a capacity of one million barrels, its cargo of oil, loaded a week earlier at Primorsk, is worth around $55m (£40.7m).
It is sailing under a Cameroon flag, owned and managed by a company in the Seychelles, and sanctioned by the EU, UK and Canada, among others.
That prevents it from using port facilities in any of the sanctioning countries, but not from heading to its next known stop, Port Said at the head of the Suez Canal. We cannot know where its oil will be unloaded, but since the invasion of Ukraine, the bulk of Russian oil has been sold to China and India, at a significant discount.
Next to appear is the Hyperion, sanctioned by the UK, EU and US, and sailing under a Russian flag with its name marked on the bow in Cyrillic.
The flag switching tactic
As recently as December, it was sailing under a Sierra Leone flag when, after making a delivery to Venezuela, it switched flags and evaded the US naval blockade in the Caribbean.
Switching flags is a routine tactic in the shadow fleet, opaque ownership is common, and insurance cover is often unclear, a serious concern given many of the vessels are ageing and poorly maintained.
The US has taken direct military action against tankers in the shadow fleet linked to Venezuela, with at least seven seized since last year, the most recently in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday.
French paramilitaries also seized a vessel in the Mediterranean last month, but despite the almost daily passage of shadow tankers through the Channel, direct British interventions so far have focused on insurance.
As we watch the passage of our third sanctioned tanker, the Kousai, we overhear a message from the coastguard to its captain on the open VHF radio channel, demanding proof of insurance.
The captain is asked to email documentation to a government email address within 24 hours. We do not hear the Kousai’s response, and in a matter of minutes, it too has passed.
A reaction to sanctions
Sanctions against Russia’s oil industry have had an impact, reducing the value of Russian oil if not the volumes that it moves.
The growth of the shadow fleet itself is a market response to tightening sanctions. With the majority of western-controlled tankers and associated marine services beyond Russia’s reach, it turned to an ad-hoc, opaque collection of older vessels to move oil, often covertly.
“Over 60% of Russian crude is being exported on the shadow fleet,” says Pamela Munger, head of European market analysis for energy analysts Vortexa.
“You have more vessels that need to be in the chain. Let’s say a sanctioned vessel loads Russian crude and let’s say it’s on its way to China.
“It could make up to five, six, seven ship-to-ship transfers along the way in order to disguise the origin of the crude and move it on to… Non-sanctioned vessels, which it will eventually discharge into its end buyer.”
Data from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air shows that the number of vessels in the shadow fleet grew following sanctions but the volume of oil being moved remained constant, even as hundreds of vessels were sanctioned directly.
Impact on the oil market
Prices have fallen, however, with Russian oil now competing with Iranian and Venezuelan crude in the “distressed” sanctioned oil market, cutting Kremlin revenues as a result.
“Russia has had to discount those crude oil cargoes in a very big way,” says David Fyfe, chief economist at commodity price specialists Argus Media.
“In 2021, Urals, the primary export grade of Russian crude, was pricing two to three dollars below North Sea Brent. As we speak in February, Urals is loading in the Baltic ports at $27 below North Sea Brent.”
That price gap has cut Russia’s oil revenues by around 25% year-on-year and by up to 50% in January alone, an economic impact the Kremlin cannot ignore.
“I think they’ll take a fairly sizeable hit, particularly in revenues this year, and I’d expect, at the very least, something like a half-a-million barrel per day hit on volumes,” says Mr Fyfe.
Are we heading for a military confrontation?
The squeeze could tighten further, with pressure for a more robust response from European nations, including the UK.
Under maritime law, all vessels have the right of innocent passage as long as they are sailing under a legitimate flag, and many countries have continued to do business with Russia since the invasion of Ukraine.
The UK government is understood to have examined the legal grounds for detaining Russian tankers, including under the Sanctions and Money Laundering Act.
“I think there must come a point at which Britain and its allies, the Dutch, and the Danes and the Norwegians and the seagoing nations of Northern Europe, they will get much tougher with these Russian ships, even if they’re escorted,” says Professor Michael Clarke, Sky News security and defence analyst.
“When that happens, I think we’re heading probably sometime this year for some sort of militarised confrontation at sea.”
A Ministry of Defence spokesperson said it has requested insurance documents from more than 600 vessels, and that “deterring, disrupting and degrading the Russian shadow fleet is a priority”.
The owners of the Rigel, the Hyperion and the Kousai have been contacted for comment.
