MINOR amendments to existing mandatory ship reporting systems don’t tend to elicit angry exchanges or end up with the International Chamber of Shipping siding with North Korea, Russia and China, against the rest of the world.

But we live in interesting times.

The question of how far Europe can go in thwarting the very real risks posed by the shadow fleet — a growing armada of vintage tankers with safety, security and political problems following them around the globe like a bad smell — is a problem for our time.

The slightly more specific question of how to deal with the even dodgier flotilla of ships flying entirely fictitious flags through sensitive sea areas, on the face of it seems easier.

It is no such thing.

The EU had tried the technical approach of amending existing rules to allow them the ability to demand certain assurances of insurance and documentation integrity. Such things are allowed for under existing international law, so they reasoned that would not present much of a barrier, legally or politically.

They were wrong.

It created quite the showdown, not that anyone was paying attention outside the IMO. But inside, the debates that started with a minor technicality erupted into a “heated” argument that covered everything from the fundamentals of freedom of navigation to a blunt prediction that if you do this then everything starts to unravel from here.

Don’t take a politically expedient route to tackling an immediate problem with the shadow fleet and risk undermining rules that shipping relies on down the line. This will come back to bite you on the aft, was essentially the message to Europe.

After several acrimonious votes, the Europeans won the day, although even as they won the day there was a palpable sense among some that this may end up proving a pyrrhic victory given what has happened since.

For all the enthusiastic rhetoric from the Baltic states insisting that the fake-flagged menace must and will be tackled, events have overtaken them.

The sabre rattling from Russia has manifested in the form of real naval escorts and they don’t seem to care too much about the legitimacy of the flags being used to carry Russian oil.

So as Denmark takes over the rotating EU presidency with a loudly stated security agenda, there is no visible plan from it on how to continue to put pressure on Russia or what it intends to do about Baltic maritime security.

Meanwhile, the increasingly routine presence of sanctioned tankers flying entirely imaginary flags through the Baltic continues to serve as an unwelcome reminder that Europe has somehow backed itself into a stalemate on the issue of fake-flagged interceptions.

Richard Meade
Editor-in-chief, Lloyd’s List

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