The Marshall Islands has closed down an insurer providing cover to so-called shadow fleet tankers carrying Russian, Venezuelan and Iranian oil.
Bloomberg cited the country’s ship registry manager International Registries as saying it had “forcibly dissolved” Continental Steamship Owners Mutual Protecting & Indemnity Association.
The report said the company was the insurer of the tanker Liberty that grounded earlier in December off Indonesia with Venezuelan fuel oil on board.
Continental Steamship’s only known address was in the Marshall Islands.
Flag states with many tankers on their books have come under international pressure to make sure their ships are not violating the Western price cap on Russian oil.
The 150,000-dwt Cameroon-flagged Liberty (built 2000) got stuck in shallow rocky waters 11 metres deep off Pulau Asam in Karimun.
The Indonesian navy has said the 1m-barrel cargo was in the process of being removed this week.
AIS data showed the 74,000-dwt panamax tanker Valente (built 2005) moored alongside the vessel up until Thursday morning.
This ship is listed as operated by Adel Ship Management of Moldova.
The Liberty was reportedly under the control of a pilot while heading into the port of Tanjung Balai Karimun.
No pollution reported
No pollution was reported and there were no injuries among the 31 crew members.
Five tugs were deployed by the port authority of Tanjung Balai Karimun.
The owner of the tanker has been Vythos Ventures of the Marshall Islands since the end of 2020 when the tanker was sold as the Kriti Spirit by Avin International of Greece for an undisclosed sum.
The ship was renamed the Riti S at that time, and it then became the Liberty in 2021.
Clarksons lists the operator as Skyward Shipmanagement Corp of Kazakhstan, while VesselsValue places the ship in the fleet of Antares Shipping Agency of Russia.
The suezmax has no port state control detentions on its record.
