Sinking the ‘Shadow Fleet’: EU Approves 17th Sanctions Package Against Russia

EU ambassadors have greenlit the bloc’s latest sanctions package against Russia on Wednesday, May 14th—the seventeenth package since the beginning of the invasion of Ukraine over three years ago. Defense and foreign affairs ministers are set to give final approval on May 20th, while two member states also need to get the measures approved by their respective parliaments.

The focus of the new package is Russia’s so-called shadow fleet of oil tankers, which have been helping Moscow evade energy sanctions since the beginning. Brussels has been trying to address the problem since the earliest packages without much success, but now hopes the new round will achieve what the previous sixteen couldn’t.

The new package added nearly 189 vessels identified to the sanctions list as part of Russia’s ‘shadow fleet’ that ship oil under foreign flags and with disabled tracking systems to sell it above the G7-imposed price cap, bringing the total number of vessels on the EU sanctions list to around 300.

Furthermore, the new list includes 30 companies involved in Russian sanctions evasion, and 75 individuals and entities linked to Russia’s military-industrial complex. It also introduces new measures to target vessels that can be used for underwater sabotage operations, as well as entities that are suspected to partake in cyberattacks against Ukrainian and EU infrastructure.

EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen—who lost her Pfizergate case in a historic ruling by the EU Court of Justice on the same day—welcomed the agreement in a statement published on X, expressing hope that it will be enough to force Russia into negotiations. 

“This war has to end. We will keep the pressure high on the Kremlin,” von der Leyen wrote.

However, what didn’t make it into the final text could be more interesting than what was included. And the elephant-sized hole on the list is Russian liquified natural gas (LNG), which Brussels has been trying to ban for over a year, but Western European countries keep blocking its efforts. 

The three main culprits are Belgium, France, and Spain, which collectively import over 90% of all the Russian LNG that arrives in the EU, reaching new records since the beginning of the war. LNG is used both as a significant portion of their domestic energy mix, and it is also re-exported for third countries for profit. 

While the EU did manage to include some partial restrictions on LNG—such as a ban on reselling to non-EU countries, or expanding the existing infrastructure—member states are still free to import, use, and re-export Russian LNG to their EU neighbors without issue.

Compared to the pre-invasion baseline in 2021, EU imports of Russian LNG have gone up by over 50%, reaching a record high of nearly 25 billion cubic meters in 2024. With prices also skyrocketing, partly due to the sanctions on pipeline gas, this means the EU has paid around €7 billion for Russian LNG just in 2024, or over €30 billion in total since the onset of the war.

While mainstream media tried to portray Brussels’ failures to ban Russian LNG in the past as a consequence of Hungarian and Slovak vetoes, neither of those countries has been importing or using it, and repeatedly stated that they would support any measure put forward against it. 

However, it would never even reach a stage where one would use its veto as long as powerful Western European countries, such as France, stand to lose significant profit from it, as the EU only picks on small member states whose energy security is on the line.

On the other hand, while the unwillingness to make serious sacrifices is on display once more, the increased energy prices due to the existing sanctions have already wrecked Europe’s economy and industry. Yet Russia does not seem to be on the brink of collapse. Instead, it hast managed to find new global markets, and is making more profit from its energy exports than before the war. 

This is why conservatives in the EU Parliament have slammed Brussels’ failed strategy in Strasbourg last week, urging the Commission to follow Washington’s lead instead by engaging both in diplomatic discussions and economic pressure with Moscow.