By Max Gardus
Last year, around 11% of recorded tanker voyages in the Baltic Sea were carried out by vessels sailing without a flag or under a false flag. In the first nine months of 2026, that figure fell to just 1%.
Pressure on flag-of-convenience states has produced results, but Moscow has found a workaround: sanctioned tankers are increasingly switching to the Russian flag.
The next step must therefore be better coordination of Ukrainian, EU and UK sanctions, tougher restrictions on companies facilitating Russian oil shipments, and effective mechanisms to deal with sanctioned vessels operating in European waters. There should be no situation in which a vessel sanctioned by Ukraine can continue operating in Europe because of discrepancies between sanctions lists.
Russian oil remains a separate challenge. The EU has already established a legal mechanism for phasing out Russian gas, but there is still no similarly clear timetable for oil. Initially, gas and oil were intended to be covered by a single regulation. It is now important to bring oil back onto the agenda and set a specific deadline for completely ending imports.
Sanctions must cover the entire network that provides Russia with money and resources for its war: energy exports, tankers, financial intermediaries, suppliers to the Russian defence industry, and sanctions-evasion schemes.
Cooperation between the government and civil society is particularly important in this regard. High-quality analytical research must be translated into sanctions dossiers, which in turn should lead to concrete decisions by Ukraine and its international partners.
