US monitored ship-to-ship oil transfers in Malaysian waters, says official

INTERVIEW | US Treasury Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson revealed that his country’s security forces had been monitoring ship-to-ship oil transfers in Malaysian waters.

Speaking to selected members of the Malaysian media, he was coy on details but highlighted the reason for his visit to the region from May 6-9.

“I would only say we have seen and we’ve promulgated some sort of guidance to the (Malaysian) marine sector about the type of services that they are engaging in.

“These are ship-to-ship transfers, particularly at night, which we see from time to time.

“They are really designed to obfuscate the origin of the commodity, in this case, Iranian oil,” said Nelson.

He said that one of the things that he really wanted to highlight is the need to push out that type of guidance to the key operators that would provide such services to support these ship-to-ship transfers.

“So that’s like the port administrators, the tugboat companies, and then all of the relatively expensive infrastructure that it takes to pull these things off.

“And typical markers that we see are like when they turn off their location device and when they’re trying to obscure the name of the ship, or they falsify or forge critical documents about the commodities that were issued.

“So, we are alerting our industry about these practices.

“We’re certainly going into jurisdictions where we’re concerned and if Iran is engaged in the ship-to-ship transfers, we want to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to alert both to the threat but also to the sort of critical mitigating steps that each industry actor can and should take in order to prevent those type of practices from continuing,” he said.

It was earlier reported that Washington wanted to prevent Malaysia from becoming a transit point for Iranian oil dodging US sanctions, helping Hamas raise funds and move money in the process.

A US official anonymously told Reuters that Iran’s ability to move its oil through Malaysia is reliant on local service providers.

A concerning development

Nelson said that his team had seen a concerning uptick in attempts by Iran and its proxies, including Hamas, to raise and move money in the region. 

“It’s appalling that they would seek to exploit the understandable outpouring of support for the Palestinian people to siphon money for violence and destabilizing activities. 

“Instead, we urge all those who wish to support humanitarian assistance in Gaza, which is an incredibly important cause, to do so through established reputable charity sources to ensure that it is not diverted,” he said.

He added that one of the main ways that the Iranian regime raises money to perpetuate violence and instability is through illicit oil sales to buyers in East Asia. 

“Many of these shipments traverse the waters around Malaysia and are loaded onto vessels of questionable legitimacy that may also pose major environmental and safety risks. 

“We’re extremely concerned about anyone providing services to the ships, especially those conducting ship-to-ship transfers of illicit oil, as these risky manoeuvres can lead to disastrous accidents or oil spills threaten the Malaysian coasts even if they occur in international waters.” - Mkini