Putins Schattentanker weichen vom Ärmelkanal ab, um einer Besetzung durch Großbritannien zu entgehen

Tankers carrying illicit Russian oil are adding days to their voyages by sailing around the north of Scotland to avoid the English Channel following Britain’s [**seizure of a “shadow fleet” vessel**](https://inews.co.uk/news/how-uk-forces-operation-seize-putin-shadow-tanker-unfolded-4477123?ico=in-line_link) last month, *The i Paper* can reveal.

In the 13 days before Royal Marines boarded [**the**](https://inews.co.uk/news/seized-putin-shadow-tanker-floating-dorset-full-crew-4615309?srsltid=AfmBOooTjjOB9g04o6ddidQOw9GVRs3Jqi4pW_DVH6yGbZTgCBuiPmMz&ico=in-line_link) [***Smyrtos***](https://inews.co.uk/news/seized-putin-shadow-tanker-floating-dorset-full-crew-4615309?srsltid=AfmBOooTjjOB9g04o6ddidQOw9GVRs3Jqi4pW_DVH6yGbZTgCBuiPmMz&ico=in-line_link), two-thirds of the tankers blacklisted for violating international sanctions passing through British waters travelled through the Channel.

But in the 13 days following the seizure, only a quarter of sanctioned tankers risked sailing between the UK and France. The vast majority took the longer route around Scotland, according to data provided by Starboard Maritime Intelligence.

Gonzalo Saiz Erausquin, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute who has been tracking changing behaviour by the shadow fleet, said that the UK Government’s [**vow to launch military operations in March**](https://inews.co.uk/news/special-forces-seize-putins-tankers-uk-waters-4317844?ico=in-line_link) had already caused the Channel to be viewed as a risky “choke point” – with the events of 14 June intensifying those fears.

“Tankers that avoid the English Channel are seeing significant disruption to their voyages, and those routes will be longer and slower and more costly,” he told *The i Paper*. “The shadow fleet is being forced to reconsider its traditional routes.”

Saiz Erausquin said that sailing around the northern tip of Scotland, as 39 shadow fleet tankers did between 14 and 26 June, was “definitely not the normal route that they would follow” to reach ports in Asia and Africa, and takes several days longer than cutting through the English Channel.

Despite the change, the overall number of sanctioned tankers sailing through waters in the UK’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) rose after the seizure of the *Smyrtos* and analysts expect Russia to continue using its “shadow fleet”.

Comprised of hundreds of ageing and often uninsured vessels with obscure ownership, the shadow fleet is used to carry Russian oil sold in contravention of a price cap imposed by G7 nations following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

The vessels often operate outside of maritime regulations by sailing under false flags in order for Putin to bypass sanctions and fund his war in Ukraine. However, this enables seizures by Britain and other countries as stateless tankers can be boarded under United Nations regulations.

“The shadow fleet can operate because, as its name says, it is somewhat in the shadows,” Saiz Erausquin said. “They can try to deceive operators into providing services, and everyone can blindly claim that they were not aware that the vessel was really linked to Russia.”

Around a dozen shadow fleet tankers have been seized since 2024 by countries including France, Sweden, Estonia, Belgium, Germany and Finland, and the pace of interceptions has increased significantly in recent months.

While the tankers began as a means of sanctions evasion, some ships have been used as a launchpad for [**Russian spy drones** ](https://inews.co.uk/news/putin-flying-spy-drones-critical-uk-sites-4501252?ico=in-line_link)or to damage undersea cables and a vessel seized by France in September was found to have employees of a Russian private military company on board.

Luke Wickenden, an analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), said that crude oil was Russia’s biggest earner in international exports, and the shadow fleet was being used to maintain profits in violation of the G7 price cap.

“Fundamental to all of this is that since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia has had to sell its crude oil at a lower price compared to the global benchmark,” he added.

“The price cap has been set quite low, and Russia would like to sell it at a higher price to increase its revenue, and that means it’s pushing crude oil onto these shadow fleet tankers, which can essentially bypass those sanctions.”

Wickenden said that although there had been a “sizeable decrease” in the export of Russian crude oil earlier this year, the main cause was thought to be Ukrainian drone strikes on oil infrastructure, rather than seizures of shadow fleet tankers.

“They are absolutely having an effect, but it’s more on the risk that the vessels are willing to take,” he added.

The English Channel, while partly falling within British territorial waters and the EEZ – areas of sea where Britain has more jurisdiction to act – is also an internationally recognised passage where freedom of navigation for international shipping normally applies.

Saiz Erausquin said an increasing number of shadow fleet vessels appeared to be taking routes aiming to evade potential seizure, either by avoiding the English Channel or other “pinch points” like the Strait of Gibraltar. A small number of vessels, he said, have even sailed all the way around Africa to avoid the Mediterranean Sea.

He said that measures by countries like Cameroon to ensure they are not used to falsely register sanctioned tankers were also forcing vessels to “find refuge under another flag” or declare themselves as Russian.

“We’ll see if Russia is willing to put their flag on more of these risky vessels,” Saiz Erausquin said, or whether it will continue to “keep the shadow fleet at arm’s length, as it’s done until now.”

They can’t sail around denmark let’s catch them there