Malaysia Lets Tankers in Iran-China STS Oil Transfer Off with a Fine

[O]n January 30 . . . a Penang State Maritime patrol boat caught two tankers in the process of carrying out an STS [ship-to-ship transfer] 24 nautical miles off Penang, on Malaysia’s west coast. The tankers involved were both sanctioned . . . The Malaysian authorities detained the crews and initially announced that the cargo was being seized.   After highlighting the seizure and reported “arrest” of the captains of the tankers, the ships quietly slipped away. Now, Captain Muhammad Suffi Mohd Ramli, the Penang maritime director at the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, confirmed that both vessels had been released on payment of a bond of $76,000, the value of the maximum penalty that can be imposed under Malaysian maritime law for conducting an unauthorized STS transfer.   The Nora headed west, presumably back towards Iran, and the Rcelebra, evidently still laden with a cargo valued at $129 million, passed Singapore through the Malacca Straits and is now anchored off Johore. . . . The United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) organization estimates from satellite imagery that STS activity off Malaysia has doubled in the last 12 months, with an estimated 60 oil tankers loaded with Iranian crude oil, while another 10 tankers from Russia and 20 from Venezuela are currently waiting to receive cargoes, all in the STS transfer box east of Malaysia’s Johore coast.