From the introduction of the EU mechanism for capping the price of seaborne Russian crude oil and petroleum products in December 2022 until the end of February 2024, about 11.4 million tons (or 82.9 million barrels) of Russian crude oil were delivered from Russian Black Sea ports to ports and transshipment points in the EU.
This was stated by Andrii Klymenko, the head of the monitoring team at the Black Sea Strategic Studies Institute, the CFTS portal reports.
According to the monitoring data presented by Klymenko, 69% of this volume in 15 months was delivered to the transshipment points in the Laconian Gulf off the coast of Greece and within the exclusive maritime economic zone of Greece.
Tankers carrying Russian crude oil directly to Italian ports, especially Sicily, accounted for 14% of the violations. Thirteen tankers delivered 1.6 million tons of crude oil in this way.
Researchers also recorded similar ship calls to ports in Spain (7%), the Netherlands (4%), Greece (3%), Poland, Croatia, and Slovenia.
According to the study, 94 tankers were involved in these shipments, of which 52 belonged to companies based in Greece; 11 belonged to companies based in Turkey; 4 belonged to Russian companies registered in the United Arab Emirates; 4 belonged to Russian companies registered in India; 3 belonged to companies based in Moldova; 3 belonged to companies based in Cyprus; 2 belonged to companies based in China; 2 belonged to companies based in Denmark; 1 belonged to a company based in Malta; 1 belonged to a company based in Great Britain; 1 belonged to a company based in Latvia; 1 belonged to a company based in Indonesia; 1 belonged to a company based in Malaysia; and only 8 belonged to companies based in offshore jurisdictions.
"In February 2024, more than 0.8 million tons of crude oil were shipped from the Black Sea to EU countries. This figure does not tend to decrease; it has been growing since October 2023, despite all kinds of 'hellish' sanctions," Klymenko said, adding that he was talking only about crude oil. According to the monitoring group, Russia shipped an additional 10.6 million tons of petroleum products from the Black Sea to the EU.
As the CFTS portal reported, in January-February of this year, Russian ports on the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov increased the transshipment of cargoes by 3.5% to 46.2 million tons. These include 24.8 million tons of liquid bulk cargo (+5.6%). In addition, the port of Novorossiysk increased cargo turnover by almost 12% to 27.6 million tons.
