Iranian ‘ghost fleet’ filmed escaping US blockade en route to China, UANI says
Small tankers from Iran’s “ghost fleet” are evading a U.S. naval blockade and smuggling permitted liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) to China via an obscure maritime hub off Malaysia, according to U.S. investigators who secretly filmed one of the ships en route in September.
United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), which led the investigation for several months, said at least nine similar tankers carrying Iranian oil or LPG had also circumvented US restrictions in the Strait of Hormuz since Washington reinstated the blockade of the Iranian port in July.
UANI identified one of the sanctioned tankers as SOGL. He reportedly escaped the blockade on September 1 with around 500,000 barrels of Iranian LPG after collecting it from an Iranian port in August.
The ship then traveled thousands of miles to an anchorage off Malaysia, where UANI filmed the ship receiving fuel and other services offshore. The ship then traveled to China, where the organization said it unloaded its Iranian cargo.
“This tanker had loaded its Iranian LPG from the port of Assaluyeh, Iran, in late August. It then violated the US blockade and headed to a Malaysian anchorage,” explained Jemima Shelley, senior analyst at UANI.
“What this shows us is that some ships are able to break through the U.S. maritime blockade,” Shelley said of the footage shared exclusively with Fox News Digital.
“Most ships are not, but since the reintegration in mid-July we have only seen nine small tankers successfully break the US blockade and leave the Gulf of Oman loaded with oil or LPG.”
At the center of the operation is the outer limits anchorage of Malaysia’s Eastern Port, known as EOPL, an offshore shipping area located approximately 70 kilometers from the Malaysian coastline.
The anchorage has become a critical step for Iran’s sanctioned energy trade with China, Shelley said.
This is an excerpt from an article by Emma Bussey of Fox News.
Gn usa
