France releases suspected Russian shadow fleet tanker after multimillion-euro penalty

PARIS (AP) — French officials said a tanker was released Tuesday It was seized in the Mediterranean last month suspected of being part of Russia’s approved shadow fleet Transporting oil in violation of international sanctions.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said in a post on channel X that the tanker Grinch would leave French territorial waters after paying a fine of “several million euros” and “three weeks of costly inactivity.”

“There is a price for bypassing European sanctions. Russia will no longer be able to finance its war with impunity through the ghost fleet off our coasts,” Barrot said.

The French army diverted the ship and anchored it in the port of Fos-sur-Mer last month as part of an investigation into the accusation of not flying a valid flag. The Indian national crew was kept on the ship.

“As part of the criminal complaint procedure, the company that owns the ship was sentenced to financial confiscation by the Marseille judicial court,” the Marseille prosecutor’s office and regional maritime authorities said in a joint statement. he said.

The exact amount of the fine was not disclosed.

Russia is believed to be using a fleet of more than 400 ships to evade sanctions. war against Ukraine. France and other countries have vowed to crack down.

The fleet consists of obsolete ships and tankers belonging to opaque organizations with addresses in non-sanctioned countries and sailing under the flags of these countries.

Last September, French naval forces Boarded another oil tanker on French Atlantic coast President Emmanuel Macron is also linked to the stay-behind fleet. Putin’s condemned this intervention as an act of piracy.

The captain of the tanker will appear in court next week over the crew’s alleged refusal to cooperate.