Tanker Tracking

In April, Iran exported almost 500,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd) to China. However, our revised figures for the previous month show it managed to export almost 1 million bpd. What accounts for this steep 50% drop? The answer is not due to any reduction in Beijing’s appetite for Iranian crude - far from it. In large measure, the explanation is logistics.

According to filings by the United States Government in a federal court proceeding pending in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, the United States seized Iranian petroleum found on board the Liberian-flagged tanker, M/T ACHILLEAS in February 2021.   According to a Verified Complaint for Forfeiture In Rem filed in Civil Action No.  21-cv-305, U.S.

The burgeoning China-Iran oil trade was given another shot in the arm in March with the launch of a “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership” deal between the two countries, worth $400 billion over 25 years.  Iran gets Chinese investment, and in return, China gets Iranian oil.  This is a huge boon to Iran in particular, as it ensures a long-term buyer for its most lucrative export while sidestepping the most important U.S. sanctions for the next quarter-century.

Forty days into the Biden Presidency, Iran had another strong month of crude oil and gas exports, hitting just over 1.4 million barrels per day (bpd), despite a slight overall drop from the previous month.

This month we spotted a Maersk-managed tanker, DIAMONDBACK, attempting to take covert delivery of Iranian fuel oil in yet another ship-to-ship (STS) transfer.

There continues to be a significant divergence in top-line figures for Iran’s oil and gas exports from the main tracking parties: Bloomberg, Kpler, OilX, Refinitiv, and TankerTrackers.com. Not only does this variance mar the accuracy of media reports, but it also presents a serious challenge to those trying to get a handle on the trajectory of the Iranian economy, given its oil revenue dependency.   

For two years, UANI has been painstakingly observing a single vessel known as “NAJAF.”  Unlike standard movement tracking, however, NAJAF never moves from its spot just offshore of the key Iraqi port of Khor al-Zubair, in the far north of the Persian Gulf.  NAJAF’s role is as a giant stationary ‘mixer,’ blending different oils in order to obscure Iranian origin, while other tankers collect the new illegal blend for onward export.

The world’s flag registries – crucial links in the chain of ocean-going commerce – deserve credit for moving decisively to thwart Iranian shipping subterfuge.  As documented in UANI’s November 12 blog post, “Stop the Hop,” the list of responsible registries is long: Comoros, the Cook Islands, Gabon, Hong Kong, Liberia, Mongolia, Panama, Palau, Sierra Leone, St.

Over the past 12 months, UANI has unearthed dozens of cases of foreign tankers in illegal clandestine operations, designed to help Iran skirt oil sanctions.

These findings have been presented to the world’s “flag registries,” which grant the licenses required for any large vessel to make international voyages.

The flag registries have stepped up.

They have launched investigations, conducted hearings, published new banned vessel lists for information sharing, and de-flagged vessels altogether.

On October 26, 2020, the Trump administration slapped counterterrorism sanctions on Iran’s Ministry of Petroleum, the National Iranian Oil Company and its tanker subsidiary, NITC.