Why Russia’s shadow fleet matters to Malta

On Tuesday afternoon, Malta’s armed forces received a mayday message from the Arctic Metagaz, an LNG tanker flying under the Russian flag. The vessel was on fire after a suspected missile attack.

Dozens of LNG tankers sail the open seas near Malta every year. What makes the Arctic Metagaz stand out is that it is linked to Russia’s shadow fleet.

The Russian shadow fleet is a clandestine network of hundreds of vessels operated by Russia to evade Western sanctions after its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Following the invasion, the European Union and G7 countries capped the price at which Russian oil could be bought using Western maritime services like shipping and insurance, in an attempt to limit the country’s revenues and throttle its war machine.

Separately, but for the same reason, several countries have imposed sanctions on LNG tankers on a vessel-by-vessel basis.

To circumvent the sanctions, Russia expanded its fleet by acquiring ageing ships primarily from Western owners through shell companies and other opaque methods. As of February 2026, Ukraine estimated that the fleet consists of 1,337 vessels.

The vessels evade sanctions in a variety of ways. Their names and countries of registration change frequently. They sail under false flags, switch off tracking signals, and broadcast false locations.

The Arctic Metagaz is a textbook example. A Norwegian-built vessel launched in 2003 and originally named Berge Everest, it has changed names and switched flags multiple times before sailing under the Russian flag. A Ukrainian government website states the vessel is sanctioned by the US, EU, UK, Switzerland, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

Consequences of a large oil spill would be disastrous- Marine biologist Daniel De Castro

Why are such ships unsafe?

Western countries have minimum criteria for marine insurance, which includes verifi­cation of the condition of the ship. Data from S&P Global Market Intelligence showed that more than 800 shadow fleet ships did not have confirmed insurance in 2025.

Many of the vessels are old and therefore more prone to breakdown or leakages. To make matters worse, shadow fleet operators obscure the identity of the true owners and have little incentive to maintain the ships to a high standard. And because they often switch off automatic identification systems and undertake open sea ship-to-ship transfers of oil, the risk of collisions and spillages is high.

The risk of a major incident has also been amplified by the recent Ukrainian strategy of targeting the vessels with drones.

In November 2025, Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) conducted drone strikes on the two shadow fleet tankers off the Turkish Black Sea coast, and later claimed responsibility.

In December, a Ukrainian intelligence source confirmed the SBU had attacked a vessel in the Mediterranean for the first time. The Oman-flagged Qendil had recently delivered oil to India and was on its way back to Russia when it was hit by an aerial drone off the coast of Libya.

The threat of an oil spill in the Mediterranean

The Qendil was empty when it was hit, and in January it ran aground on an island off the coast of Turkey.

And while it is believed the Arctic Metagaz was loaded with 138,028 cubic metres of gas worth between $50 and $60 million, experts told Times of Malta the risks of imminent environmental damage caused by the vessel’s LNG cargo were minimal.

Alfred Vella

“Any gas that didn’t burn off as CO2 will have evaporated as methane. LNG rarely causes massive explosions. However, the vessel’s own fuel and bilge water could cause harm if it were to leak out,” said University rector and chemist Alfred Vella.

However, if an oil tanker were to ever sink – either due to its poor condition or military strike – the environmental consequences would be catastrophic.

Daniel De Castro, a marine biologist and curator of the Malta National Aquarium, warned: “The consequences of a large oil spill would be disastrous.

If it happened close to Malta, depending on currents and the weather, it would directly affect all sea life in the area and would be devastating for fishermen. Some of it would also wash up onto the shore.”

If a spill were to happen further away in the Mediterranean, the country would still be affected in the long term.

“When oil sinks to the bottom it affects plankton and animals such as crabs, which would then be eaten by fish, which in turn would be eaten by us.”

Marie Claire Gatt, an ornithologist specialising in sea birds, said a large oil spill could result in the death of hundreds or thousands of birds and compromise the health and resilience of populations.

“The Maltese islands host internationally important breeding populations of three seabird species that are endemic to the Mediterranean – the Yelkouan and Scopoli’s Shearwaters, and the Mediterranean Storm-petrel.

“In the event of a spill, oil sticks to their feathers, causing them to lose their waterproofing and insulating properties, and ingestion of oil, even chronically in small amounts, is toxic.”

And even if the short-term effects of an LNG tanker going down are not as serious as the sinking of an oil tanker, the impact on climate change is significant.

“The destruction of this tanker could have released massive amounts of LNG, which turns into gas on release. This gas, 90% to 95% of which consists of methane, has a significant warming effect: while carbon dioxide lasts for centuries, methane is a potent, short-lived greenhouse gas with over 80 times the warming power of CO2,” said climate change expert John Paul Cauchi.

Like having a car crash with an uninsured driver- Maritime law expert Ann Fenech

A legal headache

From a legal point of view, seeking compensation for a disaster caused by a shadow fleet vessel in Maltese waters would be like having a car crash with an uninsured driver.

Ann Fenech

“It would be a very serious, challenging situation. Technically it should be the insurers of the vessel who should pay out, but because these vessels are insured in the Russian market, it begs the question of whether there would be any compensation to be had. Even when it comes to whether one can be compensated by a sanctioned entity, there’s a question mark,” said maritime law expert Ann Fenech.

Should the wreckage of the Arctic Metagaz enter Maltese territorial waters, Fenech said the situation would be “hugely problematic”.

“In a normal situation, the insurer would get involved and engage the services of professional salvors (companies that assist vessels in distress), but salvors wouldn’t touch a sanctioned vessel with a barge pole.”

Under EU law, Malta would also be required to issue a freezing order against the ship if it entered territorial waters. “But it’s one thing freezing a ship in normal working order, and another thing when it’s severely damaged and its value at an eventual auction is likely only as scrap metal.”

What are Malta and the EU doing about the fleet?

In recent months, the EU has ramped up actions against the shadow fleet. In February, it enacted its 20th package of sanctions, which includes a full maritime services ban on Russian crude oil and the addition of 43 more vessels to the EU’s sanctioned list, which now encompasses 640 ships.

Beyond blacklisting individual tankers, the EU is making it increasingly difficult for Russia to acquire new vessels and has implemented sweeping maintenance bans for LNG tankers and icebreakers to further dent the Kremlin’s energy export revenue.

EU member states are increasingly turning to direct maritime enforcement and enhanced surveillance to disrupt these operations. Malta has established the Global Maritime Sanctions Monitoring Centre in Valletta, which serves as an essential platform to coordinate the dismantling of the fleet’s business model through intensive scrutiny of ship histories and AIS tracking compliance.

On the high seas, national navies are actively interdicting suspect vessels; recent actions include the French Navy’s seizure of the tanker Grinch in the Mediterranean and Belgium’s capture of the Ethera in the North Sea.