New Hot Spots for Russian Crude STSs & IUU Fishing – Trade Report 

Discover a surprising new hub for Russian crude oil tanker ship-to-ship (STS) meetings (including two real-world examples) and a new illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing hot spot in this week’s Global Trade Report from Windward. 

Smuggling in the Land of the Sphinx? 

• The Greek Navy began attempting to prevent Russian oil transshipments from occurring in the Greek exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in May 2024. Following this move, Russian tankers shifted their area of operation and began ship-to-ship (STS) meetings in the Mediterranean, in areas such as Morocco, Turkey, and Malta.
• Windward’s Maritime AI™ platform detected another possible STS hub for these Russian tankers – Egypt.
• Windward’s AI-powered insights show that the number of commodity STS meetings conducted in Egypt by vessels flagged as high/moderate compliance risk related to Russia and sanctioned vessels was low over the past two years.

This pattern started to change in 2024. So far, the monthly average of such meetings increased by 166% when compared to the monthly average in 2023. The most significant months were June-August, which showed a 107% increase in the monthly average when compared to the same time period last year. The data may suggest that the Egyptian EEZ has become a new STS hub for Russian oil.

_{STS meetings conducted in the Egyptian EEZ by sanctioned and high/moderate compliance risk crude oil tankers, January 2022-August 2024.}

• Fighter Two (IMO: 9296391), a sanctioned, Cook Islands-flagged crude oil tanker, is an example. It usually sails between Russia and Egypt, and on July 14, 2024, the vessel conducted a commodity STS meeting with the Dynamik Trader (IMO: 9286657), another sanctioned tanker. 

A second example occurred in June 2024, when a Marshall Islands-flagged crude oil tanker marked as high risk since September 20, 2022 by Windward, met a Greek flagged vessel, which sailed to Italy, Greece, and Turkey after the meeting.

• By combining Windward’s STS second vessel criteria and Sequence Search, we can gain insights into the flow of Russian oil by tracking where the second vessel in the meeting sailed to directly after the meeting. 
• Most port calls conducted by the tankers that met with the Russian-related vessels in Egypt between June-August 2024 occurred in Saudi Arabia (28%), Turkey (18%), and Italy (10%).

Harming Ecuador’s Ecosystem…

• Illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing in South America has increased significantly, mostly fueled by China’s distant water fishing fleet. This has led to overfishing and damage to marine ecosystems in South America.
• In the past, the majority of IUU activity occurred in the waters of Argentina, Peru, and Colombia, as well as the international waters of the South Atlantic and South Pacific oceans. 

But Windward’s Early Detection model has identified a 430%(!) increase in the presence of IUU risk-flagged fishing vessels in the waters of Ecuador between August 25-31, 2024. Additionally, the last week of August shows an anomaly over the past four years, which may suggest a change in activity by  IUU vessels.

• The vast majority of IUU vessels operating in the last week of August in Ecuador sailed under the Chinese flag (94%). Based on the vessels’ data, one of the most prominent IUU fishing fleets operating in Ecuador over the last year is the Fu Yuan Yu fleet. 
• Windward’s MAI Expert™, the industry’s first maritime Gen AI agent, shows that vessels operating within the Fu Yuan Yu fleet are owned by “Fujian Pingtan County Ocean Fishery Group Co. Ltd.” This is a Chinese company that has been sanctioned by OFAC since December 2022, due to forced labor and illegal fishing practices. Vessels that are flagged as at risk for IUU are often also associated with forced labor, which makes them prime targets for further investigation by law enforcement agencies.

• Using Windward’s Early Detection model can detect pattern changes by IUU fishing vessels and our new MAI Expert™ agent can offer further insights on these vessels, such as operational patterns and ownership status. This helps better help understand IUU risk.

Global Trade Report – August

• Things are often different than they first appear in the maritime ecosystem. What looked like slow-speed loitering off the coast of the Sudan in August turned out to be GPS jamming. But why? We have the answer, along with a look at the new OFAC sanctions, the U.S. East Coast strike, and more.

Read more. 

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