{"id":499102,"date":"2026-06-14T10:55:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T10:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/499102\/"},"modified":"2026-06-14T10:55:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T10:55:10","slug":"uk-intercepts-russian-shadow-fleet-oil-tanker-in-english-channel-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/499102\/","title":{"rendered":"UK intercepts Russian shadow fleet oil tanker in English Channel \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/united-kingdom\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/united-kingdom\/\">British<\/a> armed forces \u200chave intercepted a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/russia\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/russia\/\">Russian<\/a> shadow fleet oil \u200btanker attempting to pass through the English Channel.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The vessel Smyrtos was boarded by \u200bRoyal Marine commandos and specially trained law enforcement \u2060officers on Sunday, \u200cBritain\u2019s \u200cministry \u200bof defence said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The vessel will \u2060be \u200bheld and monitored \u200boff the south coast of England as investigations \u200ccontinue, the statement said, \u200badding that enforcement action in Britain\u2019s \u2060territorial waters \u2060was \u200bcarried out in accordance with domestic and international law.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">British prime minister <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/keir-starmer\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/keir-starmer\/\">Keir Starmer<\/a> said he had directed the interception.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cThis successful operation delivers yet \u200canother blow to Russia \u2060and reminds those fueling Putin\u2019s war in Ukraine that \u200cwe will not let them hide,\u201d Starmer \u200bsaid in a post \u200bon X.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"The oil tanker was operating as part of Russia's shadow fleet. Photograph: Finnbarr Webster\/Getty Images\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/ALJS6MHWBWEKI6ISUKYD54PSCQ.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>The oil tanker was operating as part of Russia&#8217;s shadow fleet. Photograph: Finnbarr Webster\/Getty Images <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Starmer, who is facing a potential leadership challenge and lost his defence secretary last week over a dispute about military spending, had in March given permission for the British military to board and detain Russian ships that western governments say help Moscow export oil despite sanctions.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The prime \u200cminister\u2019s change of \u2060stance did not immediately have any impact on the number of Russian vessels under sanctions passing through UK waters, according to a \u200cReuters analysis which showed a similar number transited its waters before and after the announcement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Until \u200bSunday, Britain\u2019s involvement in efforts to stop the vessels \u200bhad been limited to supporting French and US operations.\u00a0\u2013 Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"British armed forces \u200chave intercepted a Russian shadow fleet oil \u200btanker attempting to pass through the English Channel.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":499103,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,1194,43,3589,40,38,41,39,1577],"class_list":["post-499102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-keir-starmer","tag-news","tag-russia","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-uk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499102\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/499103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}