Nord/LB has arrested a pair of very large gas carriers owned by China’s Kunlun Holdings.
The 78,400-cbm vessels Gas Infinity (built 1997) and Sea Dragon (built 1993) were taken into the custody of the Sheriff of Singapore on Monday and Wednesday of this week.
Court records indicate that Nord/LB filed a $7.5m mortgage claim against the Gas Infinity and a $22.7m mortgage claim against the Sea Dragon.
As of Friday, it was unclear whether Nord/LB’s arrest actions were due to payment problems or recent public allegations that Kunlun’s VLGCs are being used to carry sanctioned Iranian LPG to China.
Iran watchers have accused the company’s gas carriers of turning off their Automatic Identification System transponders while in the Middle East Gulf, and conducting ship-to-ship transfers off the coast of Malaysia.
Bloomberg ship tracking data has highlighted several of Kunlun’s VLGCs engaging in suspicious activities that the news organisation said last week was highly characteristic of vessels attempting to carry sanctioned Iranian cargoes while keeping under the radar.
Kunlun has repeatedly rebuffed media enquiries about its shipping activities in recent weeks.
"I do not understand," said Kunlun vice president for chartering Captain Robert Xu Rongbao, in response to separate calls from different TradeWinds phone numbers first in English and later in Chinese.
Nord/LB’s Singapore office, which filed the claims against Kunlun’s ships, could not be reached after office hours on Friday evening.
