BRUSSELS, February 10. /TASS/. EU countries with access to the Baltic Sea are developing legal measures that would allow them to carry out mass detentions of vessels allegedly belonging to Russia’s "shadow fleet". This was reported to Politico by European officials and diplomats.
According to them, the new legislation will let them seize a vessel for the potential harm it may allegedly cause to the environment and for the purported damage to underwater cables and other critical undersea infrastructure. In the latter case, the authorities can use "piracy laws," the newspaper’s sources noted.
They disclosed that a number of EU countries, particularly Lithuania and Estonia, are also planning to develop a prescribed list of "credible" marine insurers: if a vessel is insured by a company not included in this list, it will be detained. "Using already existing [international] conventions […] is hard," said Estonia’s Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna. "We have enough opportunities to act more decisively […] and we are going to do it at the EU level," the top Estonian diplomat added.
Lithuanian Defense Minister Dovile Sakaliene insisted that seizing vessels will be "justified." "Sanctioned ships shouldn’t be floating around happily without any problems," Politico quoted her as saying. "Countermeasures to the shadow fleet would be really helping to achieve the results, which we are not capable of achieving through the sanctions regime," Lithuania’s Energy Minister Zygimantas Vaiciunas told Politico. According to the newspaper’s sources, given the scale of the planned operation, the EU would require NATO support.
Experts polled by Politico believe that seizing Russia-affiliated oil tankers will violate international law, exacerbate relations with Russia and incur steep financial costs. "It’s absolutely going to be challenged under international law," potentially costing countries "tens of millions," said Isaak Hurst, principal attorney at the International Maritime Group law firm. That makes imposing national laws to seize vessels an "incredibly risky" endeavor, he said, noting "the cost of keeping the crew on board detained vessels, handling related immigration issues and ‘blowback from the flag state.’" "Politically, it’s just a hot mess," Hurst added.
After the conflict in Ukraine escalated in 2022, the European Union imposed restrictive measures against 79 oil tankers allegedly affiliated with Russia within the framework of anti-Russian sanctions. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov noted that the naturally established export routes of Russian energy products cannot be "severed" by sanctions because alternatives immediately emerge.