France Releases Suspected Russian Shadow Fleet Tanker After Fine Paid

France says it has released an oil tanker suspected of being part of Russia’s sanctions-busting “shadow fleet!” after its owner paid a fine.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said the vessel, named Grinch, was “leaving French waters” on Tuesday having paid a penalty of “several million euros”.

France says it has released an oil tanker suspected of being part of Russia’s sanctions-busting “shadow fleet!” after its owner paid a fine.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said the vessel, named Grinch, was “leaving French waters” on Tuesday having paid a penalty of “several million euros”.

The tanker was seized by French forces in the Mediterranean in January and then diverted to the port city of Marseille. It had set sail from Murmansk in northern Russia and was flying under a Comoros flag, officials said.

Moscow’s so-called shadow fleet is a clandestine network of tankers used to evade Western sanctions on Russian oil exports by using aged tankers with obscure ownership or Insurance.

Many Western countries imposed sanctions on Russian oil after it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

“Circumventing European sanctions comes at a price. Russia will no longer be able to finance its war with impunity through a ghost fleet off our coasts,” Barrot said in a post on X.

He added: “The tanker Grinch will leave French waters after shelling out several million euros and three weeks of costly immobilisation at Fos-sur-Mer. Let’s keep it up.”

“As part of a guilty plea procedure the company that owns the vessel was sentenced by the Marseille judicial court to a financial penalty of confiscation,” the public prosecutor’s office and regional maritime authorities said in a statement.

BBC