THE US, UK and Denmark and other countries have called for more action, including increased surveillance, over the booming practice of unregulated oil transfers at sea, according to a paper submitted to the United Nations, Reuters reports.
The number of Russian-affiliated oil tankers "going dark" to avoid being tracked in the south Atlantic has doubled in recent months in a sign of clandestine means being deployed to avoid sanctions, reports the UK Guardian.
By switching off their tracker systems on the high seas, the ships can quietly transfer oil on to tankers without links to Russia so as to avoid their oil exports being flagged.
"These transfers undermine the rules-based international order and increase the risk of pollution to nearby coastal states. This threatens global efforts to prevent pollution from ships," the UN paper said.
Tankers able to hide any Russian links, by illicit transfers mid-ocean, would hope to avoid any price attestation of their cargo.
Russia had been learning from Iran and North Korea over the past six months on how to circumvent sanctions.
The spike in dark activity in the south Atlantic had followed a smaller, and since reversed, period of activity in the north Atlantic, between May and August, he said.
Lloyd's List then published a report at the end of July suggesting that five Chinese-owned ships were being used to transfer Russian oil at a hub about 860 nautical miles west of Portugal's coast.
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