The captain of an oil tanker intercepted by the French navy in the Mediterranean has been detained as part of an investigation into whether the vessel was operating under a false flag, the Marseille prosecutor’s office said on Sunday.
The tanker, named Grinch, was seized on Thursday and diverted to anchor off the French port city of Marseille on suspicion of being part of a so-called “shadow fleet” used to bypass international sanctions on Russian oil exports.
According to prosecutors, the 58-year-old captain, an Indian national, has been taken into custody under preliminary investigations. Other crew members, also Indian nationals, remain on board the vessel while authorities verify the validity of the ship’s flag and navigation documents.
French authorities said the Grinch departed from the Russian port of Murmansk in early January and was sailing under a Comoros flag at the time of interception. The prosecutor’s statement did not explicitly mention Russia.
The European Union has imposed 19 rounds of sanctions against Russia since the start of the Ukraine conflict. However, Moscow has adapted to many of these measures and continues to export millions of barrels of oil, often at discounted prices, to countries such as India and China.
A significant portion of these exports is transported by vessels operating outside the Western maritime system, commonly referred to as a “shadow fleet”.
In a similar incident, France detained another sanctioned oil tanker, Boracay, off its west coast in October last year before releasing it after a few days.