Think tank says 30 false-flag tankers shipped EUR 2.1 bn Russian oil to India in 2025

New Delhi: India imported 5.4 million tonnes of Russian oil worth EUR 2.1 billion between January and September 2025 aboard 30 vessels sailing under false flags, a European think tank said in a report on Thursday.

The shipments formed the single largest national destination for crude moved by Russia's expanding "shadow fleet", according to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA).

After the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Western countries imposed sanctions on Russian energy. Moscow is accused of dodging these by using shadow fleets - aged tankers operating in legal grey areas with obscure ownership, false registration papers, and disabled tracking system - to ship oil to consumers including China, India and Turkey.

Helsinki-based CREA said a total of 113 Russian vessels have flown a false flag in the first nine months of this year, transporting 13 per cent of all Russian crude oil - 11 million tonnes valued at 4.7 billion euros (USD 5.4 billion).

"As of September 2025, there were 90 Russian 'shadow' vessels operating under false flags - a six-fold increase from December 2024," it said.

The report however, did not give a break-up of the destinations the shadow fleet had sailed to.

When reached by PTI for false-flagged ships ferrying oil to India, CREA said 30 such vessels shipped crude oil to India during the first nine months of 2025.

"Of the EUR 4.7 billion of Russian oil transported on falsely flagged tankers in the first three quarters of 2025, EUR 2.1 billion (5.4 million tonnes) was transported to India," CREA told PTI.

Traditionally reliant on Middle Eastern oil, India significantly increased its imports from Russia following the February 2022 Ukraine invasion. Western sanctions and reduced European demand made Russian oil available at steep discounts.

As a result, India's Russian crude imports surged from under 1 per cent to nearly 40 per cent of its total crude oil imports in a short span. In November, Russia continued to be India's top supplier, making up for over a third of all crude oil imported by the country.

All vessels at sea must fly a flag granting them legal jurisdiction. Under the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea, countries can register ships and allow them to fly their flags. Some nations operate open registries, letting foreign-owned ships register for lower costs and lighter regulations - a practice often used by shippers seeking flexibility.

CREA in the report said 96 sanctioned vessels had flown a false flag at least once this year as of the end of September.

A total of 85 vessels registered at least two flag changes six months after being sanctioned by the European Union, the United States Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) or the United Kingdom, the think tank said.

Six flag registries that never flagged a Russian ship since the February 2022 Ukraine invasion each had at least 10 such vessels each in their fleet by September 2025, totalling 162 shadow vessels, according to CREA.

"The number of Russian 'shadow' tankers sailing under false flags is now increasing at an alarming rate. False-flagged vessels carried EUR 1.4 billion worth of Russian crude oil and oil products through the Danish Straits in September alone," said Luke Wickenden, Energy Analyst and co-author of the report. "The insurance of any vessel flying a false flag is void, which, combined with the fact that a lot of these tankers are old and have been re-commissioned almost from scrap, increases risk for coastal states which fall on their routes, in the event of accidents or an oil spill."

CREA urged the EU and UK to spearhead global reforms, noting that false-flag operations violate Article 94 of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and pose mounting environmental and security threats to European and British coastlines. Detaining such vessels, it said, would disrupt Russian export logistics, raise costs and reduce the reliability of oil flows that underpin Moscow's war effort.

"In addition to the risks of false flagging, we also see that 'shadow' vessel operators are taking advantage of capacity limitations of economically weak nations to exploit their flags and existing regulations to gain passage rights to deliver blood oil," said Vaibhav Raghunandan, CREA EU-Russia Analyst & Research Writer and co-author of the report. "It falls on the international community to push for reform in flag state regulations, provide support to build capacity for flag registries, as well as detain falsely flagged vessels to constrict 'shadow' vessel operations that support and finance Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine."