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Russia is quietly assembling a shadow fleet of liquefied natural gas carriers, extending to gas the same sanctions-evasion playbook it built for crude oil, in a move designed to keep Moscow's energy revenues flowing once the European Union's import ban takes effect. The Financial Times reported on Monday, citing data from maritime analytics firm Windward, that Russia's specialised covert gas fleet has grown to 25 vessels over the past six months. The expansion includes at lea

Saudi Arabia has moved to assemble a multinational maritime defence coalition to protect Red Sea shipping, a rapid political-military escalation of the chokepoint crisis that has severed normal tanker traffic through the region and pulled European naval assets deeper into the conflict. Military representatives from 43 of 51 invited nations, alongside a European Union delegation, gathered in Riyadh on Thursday to discuss the initiative, with the kingdom naming itself founding

The two maritime arteries carrying most of the Gulf's oil to Europe and Asia are now effectively closed simultaneously, a dual blockade that has severed normal commercial tanker traffic at both ends of the region and pushed the operational risk picture to its most severe of the conflict. Maritime intelligence firm Windward assessed on Thursday that both the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb strait are effectively shut to normal commercial tanker movements, for different

Shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb strait has collapsed to its lowest level in months after Houthi attacks on Saudi oil installations, deepening a two-front squeeze on the maritime arteries that feed crude to Europe and Asia and keeping freight and insurance costs elevated for owners. Only 15 commodity vessels transited the waterway on Sunday, down 56 per cent from the 34 that crossed on 20 July, the day the Iran-aligned group first declared a maritime embargo on Saudi-linked

The European Commission has proposed drawing vessels between 400 and 5,000 gross tonnage into the EU Emissions Trading System, a targeted expansion that shipowners have broadly welcomed while pressing Brussels for firmer commitments on where the money goes. The draft forms part of a wider climate policy overhaul and would close several avenues for cost avoidance. Offshore worksites in EU waters would be treated as ports of call, preventing offshore vessels from sidestepping E

A reported approach by MSC founder Gianluigi Aponte to the anchor shareholders of Hapag-Lloyd has revived questions over the durability of European container shipping's ownership structures, even as both companies publicly dismissed the talk. Aponte, the 85-year-old patron of the Geneva-based group that ranks as the world's largest container carrier, has reportedly been sounding out the main owners of the Hamburg-based line for some time, according to a Manager Magazin report

Europe's container shipping order is once again under strain. Gianluigi Aponte, the 85-year-old founder of Geneva-based Mediterranean Shipping Company, has been sounding out Hapag-Lloyd's anchor shareholders about a stake in the German carrier, according to Manager Magazin, a move that would reshape the competitive map of the world's busiest east-west trade lanes. Both companies have publicly denied the report, with MSC calling it untrue and Hamburg-based Hapag-Lloyd dismissi

Brussels has closed off any escape route for European companies still tied to Russian liquefied natural gas, ruling that the bloc's looming import ban applies to EU operators wherever in the world the cargoes are headed. In a letter from the office of Energy Commissioner Dan Jorgensen to shipbroker and consultancy Poten & Partners, the European Commission stated that transporting Russian LNG by Union operators, irrespective of the final destination, is prohibited under the ba

The European Union has escalated its campaign against Russia's energy export machine, sanctioning the shipping arms of Gazprom and Lukoil in a move that targets the country's largest oil producers directly rather than the intermediaries that have long shielded them. In a decision published in the bloc's Official Journal on Monday, EU governments added Gazpromneft Shipping and Lukoil-Western Siberia to the sanctions list, accusing both of transporting Russian crude while engag

British forces boarded and detained a sanctioned Russian shadow fleet oil tanker in the English Channel on Sunday, in what the Ministry of Defence described as the first operation of its kind led by the UK, marking a significant escalation in European efforts to choke off the Kremlin's sanctions-evading oil trade. Royal Marine commandos and specially trained law enforcement officers from the National Crime Agency boarded the vessel during a six-hour operation, supported by Ch

European shipowners and fuel suppliers are bracing for a decisive autumn at the International Maritime Organization, where member states will reconvene in October to attempt, for a second time, to adopt the Net-Zero Framework that would impose the world's first legally binding carbon price across an entire industry. The stakes for Europe are considerable. The framework, approved in principle at the regulator's London headquarters in April 2025, pairs a global fuel standard wi

European importers are confronting a fresh squeeze on supply chains as container freight rates from Asia spike at the fastest pace in a year, driven by the prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz and an unusually early start to the peak shipping season. The spot rate for a 40-foot container to northern Europe from Asia reached $3,649 in the week to 5 June, a 27 per cent jump on the previous week, according to Oslo-based freight platform Xeneta. Charges on Europe-bound boxes