{"id":1255,"date":"2026-06-15T05:08:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-15T09:08:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/?p=1255"},"modified":"2026-06-15T05:52:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T09:52:09","slug":"uk-seizure-of-shadow-fleet-tanker-smyrtos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/2026\/06\/15\/uk-seizure-of-shadow-fleet-tanker-smyrtos\/","title":{"rendered":"UK &#8211; seizure of shadow fleet tanker &#8220;Smyrtos&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On Sunday <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/news\/uk-forces-intercept-russian-shadow-fleet-vessel-for-the-first-time-in-blow-to-putins-war-chest\">British armed forces<\/a> boarded and detained the &#8220;shadow fleet&#8221; oil tanker <em>Smyrtos<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While British forces have assisted other nations previously, this is the first time that the UK has detained a shadow fleet vessel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The vessel was in international waters in the English Channel, and the press release refers to UNCLOS Article 110 as giving a power to exercise &#8220;a right of visit&#8221; where there are reasonable grounds to suspect the vessel is without nationality&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The vessel is now anchored off the south coast of England.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/clyek039l2vo\">BBC reporting<\/a> notes that the vessel claims a Cameroon flag, and that it has changed its flag multiple times since it was designated by the UK in July 2025. The same reporting has added that a 38-year old Indian national has been arrested on suspicion of offences under the UK&#8217;s Russian sanctions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Lloyd&#8217;s List, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lloydslist.com\/LL1157457\/UK-seizes-shadow-fleet-tanker-expelled-from-Cameroon-registry?utm_source=search&amp;utm_medium=RSS&amp;utm_term=&amp;utm_campaign=search_rss\">is reporting<\/a> that Cameroon had previously expelled the <em>Smyrtos<\/em> from its registry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Our <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/2026\/03\/09\/round-up-of-sanctions-related-european-vessel-seizures\/\">European Vessel Seizure Tracker<\/a> has been updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On Sunday British armed forces boarded and detained the &#8220;shadow fleet&#8221; oil tanker Smyrtos. While British forces have assisted other nations previously, this is the first time that the UK has detained a shadow fleet vessel. The vessel was in international waters in the English Channel, and the press release refers to UNCLOS Article 110 &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/2026\/06\/15\/uk-seizure-of-shadow-fleet-tanker-smyrtos\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;UK &#8211; seizure of shadow fleet tanker &#8220;Smyrtos&#8221;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":656,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104,2,70],"tags":[18,34,9],"ppma_author":[7],"class_list":["post-1255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-104","category-general","category-infrastructure-and-transport","tag-russia","tag-trade-sanctions","tag-united-kingdom"],"authors":[{"term_id":7,"user_id":656,"is_guest":0,"slug":"mhandley","display_name":"Mark Handley","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/65\/2023\/09\/handleymark-100x100.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Handley","first_name":"Mark","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/markhandley.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/markhandley.html\">Read Mark's bio.<\/a>"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/656"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1255\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1255"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/europeansanctionsenforcement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=1255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}