A Russian tanker carrying 1 million barrels of oil to Syria
TankerTrackers, a website specializing in tracking and reporting global crude oil shipments, confirmed that Russia has sent an oil tanker carrying one million barrels of crude oil to Syria.
This tanker is expected to arrive on April 3rd, and its the third Russian tanker documented to arrive since the fall of the Syrian regime on December 8th, 2024.
According to the website’s reports, the oil tanker Sabina (No. 9524451), which has been blacklisted by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), was tasked with delivering the fuel shipment to Syria, having departed from the Russian port of Murmansk.
The tanker Sabena rise the flag of Barbados and operates as part of the Russian shadow fleet.
Tanker Trackers noted that Russia is exploiting fuel shipments as a source of income to support its military presence in the Syrian port of Tartus.
Earlier, two tankers arrived in Syria on March 12, one carrying gas and the other diesel, both exported from Russia.
According to Engineer Majd al Sini, head of the offshore terminal department at the Syrian Petroleum Company, indicated at the time that the tankers “Gas Catalina,” carrying 4,000 tons of domestic gas, and “Prosperity,” carrying approximately 34,000 tons of diesel, had been connected to unload their cargoes.
According to the Russian TASS news agency, the delivery of these two tankers was supervised and organized by Russia, with the diesel being shipped from the Russian port of Primorsk in February.
The first Russian fuel tanker to arrive in Syria after the fall of Assad arrived on February 28.
On the other hand, the Syrian authorities don’t explicitly announce the sources of the oil, merely mentioning the arrival of oil tankers without further details.
In a statement to Enab Baladi, Ahmad Suleiman, the director of public relations at the Syrian Ministry of Oil, explained that the various oil sources are based on tenders issued by the ministry to import crude oil and petroleum derivatives to meet the needs of the population.
Minister of Oil and Mineral Resources Ghiath Diab confirmed in an interview with CNBC Arabia on January 12 that fuel imports are now open to all companies and countries, without restricting imports to the government alone.
He noted that the Syrian government has begun cooperating with the private sector on this matter.
