‘Zombie ships’ help keep Venezuelan oil industry alive

A 27-year-old crude tanker that was supposedly scrapped in 2021 is due to reach Venezuela late this week, according to ship-tracking data, in the latest example of how the South American country keeps its embattled oil industry alive.

The tanker identifying itself as Freesia I is likely to be a zombie vessel, meaning it is in fact another tanker assuming the identity of a dismantled ship. This tactic is occasionally employed by ships ferrying sanctioned oil in order to obscure their trajectories and cargoes.

Venezuela’s oil industry, once a global powerhouse, has been decimated by years of sanctions and underinvestment. But it has continued to export, mostly to China, thanks to some of the oldest and murkiest tankers in the global fleet — a maritime lifeline for the economy and for the government of President Nicolás Maduro.

In the year to date, Caracas has shipped nearly 900,000 barrels per day of oil, according to the analytics firm Kpler. That’s a fraction of what it once sold, but enough to goad the United State into some of the most forceful sanctions enforcement to date.

“Venezuela has been remarkably effective at masking both origin and ownership of crude and therefore at evading financial and trade-related controls,” said Dimitris Ampatzidis, senior risk and compliance analyst at Kpler.

“That’s why Washington has increasingly moved from purely financial measures to physical disruption.”

US forces have struck alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean and since early December have chased or boarded three tankers in waters near Venezuela, including one non-sanctioned vessel — a significant escalation.

Washington says the campaign is meant to deter illicit activity and to signal that the US wants Maduro out of power. President Donald Trump has also said the US would keep any seized crude.

“While the US has sanctioned numerous vessels and organisations, it hasn’t stemmed the flow. Physical boarding is the next step,” said Mark Douglas, a maritime domain analyst at Starboard Maritime Intelligence.

“It’s a signal that falsifying locations and documentation is no longer a shield. It’s now what makes you a target.”

Out of a dark fleet of roughly 1,500 vessels — often old, usually uninsured and owned by shell companies — Venezuela relies on close to 400 ships, according to TankerTrackers.com.

The tankers indulge in most of the dark fleet’s typical practices to obscure movements and ownership, including spoofing, or the use of fake locations. As with Freesia I, they also occasionally assume the identity of other, often dismantled, ships.

The vessel identifying as Freesia I was at the Port of José oil-export terminal, which handles 70% of Venezuela’s crude shipments, in early May. It began its most recent trip in Southeast Asia in November, signalling it would arrive at the Amuay port in Venezuela on Dec 26, likely to receive a new cargo.

It later switched the destination to “High Sea”, before turning off its transponder altogether on Tuesday, off French Guiana.

Spoofing is also common. The Skipper, the first Venezuela tanker to be targeted by US forces, was using this tactic when it was captured earlier this month.

The 20-year-old tanker indicated through tracking systems, starting in late October, that it was idling off Guyana. Instead, satellite images captured on Nov 14 and reviewed by Bloomberg News showed Skipper, with red tips on either side of its deck, docked at the Port of José.

That suggests the ship had been manipulating its signals, and only on the day of the US seizure did Skipper reveal its true location.

At the time of seizure, Skipper said it was sailing under the Guyanese flag, but that has since been disputed by the South American country. Ships of all types need to be registered with a certain country’s flag registry, which in turn enforces safety and crew-welfare standards on board those ships. Many in the dark fleet turn to flags of convenience or false registrations to avoid inspection.

Venezuela’s regular dark fleet tankers are typically provided by other countries, as Caracas is unable to finance its own flotilla, and cannot rely on an existing fleet that is too small and old.

Source – Bangkok News