Russia has sent a submarine and other naval assets to escort an empty, rusting oil tanker that has become a new flashpoint in U.S.-Russia relations, according to a U.S. official.
The tanker, formerly known as the Bella 1, has been trying to evade the U.S. blockade of sanctioned oil tankers near Venezuela for more than two weeks. The vessel failed to dock in Venezuela and load with oil. Despite being empty, the U.S. Coast Guard has pursued the ship into the Atlantic in a bid to crack down on a fleet of tankers that ferry illicit oil around the world, including black-market oil sold by Russia.
The vessel’s crew repelled an effort by the U.S. to board the vessel in December and steamed into the Atlantic. As the Coast Guard followed it, the crew sloppily painted a Russian flag on its side, changed its name to the Marinera and switched its registration to Russia.
Russia has been concerned by U.S. seizures of tankers that ferry its illicit oil around the world and power its economy, and it has made the unusual move of allowing the tanker to register in Russia without an inspection or other formalities, experts say.
Russia has asked the U.S. to stop pursuing the vessel, according to three other U.S. officials. On Tuesday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said it was monitoring “with concern” the situation surrounding the tanker, according to state news agency RIA.
The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment, but the U.S. military’s Southern Command said on social media Tuesday that it was ready to “stand against sanctioned vessels and actors transiting through this region.”
The Coast Guard has continued to trail the ship into the Eastern Atlantic, where it is now sailing about 300 miles south of Iceland toward the North Sea, according to AIS positioning.
Russia’s state-controlled foreign media outlet RT posted a video apparently taken from the deck of the oil tanker showing the U.S. Coast Guard cutter trailing the vessel. In a separate post on social media, the outlet said the U.S. was attempting to intercept the tanker, bound for Murmansk, Russia, despite its “clear civilian status.”
The tanker flare-up comes as Washington and Moscow have engaged in diplomatic wrangling on Ukraine, threatening to complicate the talks. Russia has yet to accept a peace framework the U.S. and Ukraine have put forward.
“I’m not thrilled with Putin. He’s killing too many people,” said Trump on Saturday, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The U.S. has already apprehended two very large crude carriers, the Skipper and the Centuries, which are part of the fleet that transports illicit oil, and officials have said more seizures could come.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—and the Western sanctions that followed—sparked a rapid expansion of the global dark fleet, an armada of more than 1,000 tankers with obscure ownership and no Western insurance, according to some analysts. The vessels conceal their role in shipping oil by using deceptive tactics, such as switching off their radio signals to obscure their movements and transferring cargo to other vessels in poorly monitored waters. Most of these tankers are over 15 years old, prompting fears of major spills and collisions.
The Kremlin didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Moscow has previously rejected characterizations that it uses a shadow fleet and has called Western sanctions illegitimate.
At the time the U.S. began pursuing the tanker, the Bella 1 was a stateless vessel flying a false flag and subject to a judicial seizure order, according to the White House. The U.S. had sanctioned the Bella 1 for allegedly carrying black-market Iranian oil on behalf of U.S.-designated terrorist organizations aligned with Tehran.
However, the ship’s new Russian registration now complicates the U.S. legal justification for boarding it, experts say.
“Once it’s legitimately registered, it gets the protection of the flag” under international law, said retired Rear Adm. Fred Kenney, former director of legal affairs and external relations at the International Maritime Organization. “It’s not retroactive, you can’t say it was stateless two weeks ago so we’re going to say it’s stateless now.”
A U.S. move to forcibly board the vessel could also open the door for retaliation by Russia and aligned nations like Iran, the experts say.
“Will Russia step in and protect the dark fleet on a regular basis? That would undercut the argument that they have legitimate ties to the vessels,” said William Baumgartner, former judge advocate general and chief counsel for the Coast Guard. “If they repeat this, it does raise the question of whether this is a legitimate change in registry, or if it appears to be done for nefarious reasons.”
Write to Shelby Holliday at shelby.holliday@wsj.com, Costas Paris at costas.paris@wsj.com and Georgi Kantchev at georgi.kantchev@wsj.com