By Pishtaz | 2024-10-10

Though the Iranian regime has continued to smuggle oil, in violation of sanctions, there are signs that a ripple of alarm has run through its oil export operations following its October 1 missile barrage on Israel.

Satellite imagery reveals tankers have rapidly vacated the waters around Iran's Kharg Island oil terminal in the aftermath of the attack, in a move observers see as a sign that the Iranian regime is anticipating a retaliation.

"The National Iranian Tanker Company appears to be fearing an imminent attack by Israel," Tanker Trackers said in an October 3 post on X.

"Their empty VLCC (very large crude carrier) supertankers vacated the country's largest oil terminal, Kharg Island, yesterday," it said.

"Please note that crude oil loadings continue, but all of the extra vacant shipping capacity has been removed from the anchorage of Kharg Island," it said in a separate post.

"This is the first time we see anything like this since the 2018 sanctions round."

'Ghost armada'

In late September, just before Iran's missile salvo, Iranian crude oil was transferred between two "dark fleet" tankers, the Fortune Galaxy and Serrano II, in the Arabian Gulf, according to maritime website gCaptain.

The transfer, which caused an oil spill, is the latest in a series of incidents involving Iran's "dark fleet" tankers -- ships that use deceptive practices to transport oil and evade tracking.

Deceptive practices include ship-to-ship transfers of oil, disabling or manipulating a vessel's automatic identification system (AIS), changing the flag under which a ship sails, and falsifying cargo documentation.

The Iranian regime is "almost entirely dependent" on a "ghost armada" of 400 tankers registered outside the country, United Against Nuclear Iran research director Daniel Roth told the London Times.

"Absent this fleet, the regime would be down well over ­$100 billion in lost exports revenues over the past four years," he said.

"That's a lot of money unavoidably earmarked for terrorist proxies, ballistic missiles and drones programs, and the nuclear file."

Funds for proxies

The regime's illicit trafficking of oil funds the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its Quds Force -- its main mechanism for providing lethal support to terrorist organizations abroad, per the US Justice Department.

According to Tanker Trackers, Iran is smuggling an estimated 1.7 million barrels of oil per day, most of which is exported to China as crude oil, gas and condensates.

As of late August, Iran had stored 17 million barrels of oil on tankers anchored in the Arabian Gulf and around China, waiting to be transported, according to commodities tracking company Kepler.