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Advocacy Group: US Firm's Tanker Illicitly Traded Iran Oil

In this satellite photo provided by Planet Labs PBC, a vessel identified as the Virgo by the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran is seen off Khargh Island, Iran, on Jan. 16, 2022. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
In this satellite photo provided by Planet Labs PBC, a vessel identified as the Virgo by the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran is seen off Khargh Island, Iran, on Jan. 16, 2022. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
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Advocacy Group: US Firm's Tanker Illicitly Traded Iran Oil

In this satellite photo provided by Planet Labs PBC, a vessel identified as the Virgo by the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran is seen off Khargh Island, Iran, on Jan. 16, 2022. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
In this satellite photo provided by Planet Labs PBC, a vessel identified as the Virgo by the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran is seen off Khargh Island, Iran, on Jan. 16, 2022. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)

A tanker owned by a Los Angeles-based private equity firm likely took part in the illicit trade of Iranian crude oil at sea despite American sanctions targeting Iran, an advocacy group alleges. The firm said Thursday it is cooperating with US government investigators.

The group United Against Nuclear Iran raised its allegations in a letter dated Tuesday to Oaktree Capital Management, which holds assets worth over $160 billion. Satellite images and maritime tracking data analyzed by The Associated Press correspond to the group's identification of the vessels allegedly involved and showed them side-by-side off the coast of Singapore on Saturday.

The alleged oil transfer comes as world powers and Iran negotiate in Vienna over restoring the nuclear deal. That accord saw Tehran drastically limit its enrichment of uranium in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions — including those targeting its crucial oil sales.
But Iran even under American sanctions claims to be selling billions of dollars more of crude than before, likely buoyed by energy prices rising to their highest point in years amid the ongoing Ukraine crisis. That makes the sales even more lucrative and increases the challenge of enforcing sanctions if the Vienna talks collapse.

In a statement to the AP, Oaktree subsidiary Fleetscape — which owns the oil tanker Suez Rajan — said it is “committed to using best practices in its operations and complying with US sanctions laws.”

“We take any allegation of non-compliance very seriously and are cooperating fully with the US authorities to conduct a thorough investigation into this matter,” Fleetscape said.

The company did not elaborate. The US State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The US Treasury, which investigates and enforces sanctions, declined to comment.

Satellite-tracking data from MarineTraffic.com analyzed by the AP showed the Marshall Island-flagged Suez Rajan in the South China Sea off the northeast of Singapore on Saturday. That data also shows the Panamanian-flagged oil tanker Virgo in the same area.

Satellite photos from Planet Labs PBC of that area obtained by the AP appear to show the ships alongside each other. At sea, oil tankers can funnel crude between each other in a ship-to-ship transfer that typically sees boats in a similar position.

In separate Planet Labs satellite images from Jan. 16, the Virgo appears to be loading crude oil from Iran's Khargh Island, its main oil distribution terminal in the Arabian Gulf. Tracking data separately shows the vessel near Khargh around that time before heading to Singapore.

United Nations records show the Virgo's owners as a company out of Suriname, which could not be immediately reached for comment.

Iran's mission to the United Nations also did not respond to a request for comment.

Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers saw it regain the ability to sell oil openly on the international market. But in 2018, then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew from the accord and re-imposed American sanctions. That slammed the door on much of Iran's lucrative crude oil trade, a major engine for its economy and its government.

But in recent months, Iranian officials have been suggesting they've been able to sell crude oil anyway around American sanctions. The Central Bank of Iran issued statistics at the start of February suggesting it made $18.6 billion in oil sales in the first half of this Persian year, as opposed to $8.5 billion the same period last year, according to the state-run IRAN newspaper.

Much of that oil is believed to be heading to China, some through similar ship-to-ship transfers that United Against Nuclear Iran believes took place with the Suez Raja this week. Venezuela also has received Iranian tankers to its ports.

Iran is “dependent on the international shipping industry for imports of sensitive technology and industrial goods as well as oil and petrochemical exports needed to fund” its nuclear program, the New York-based United Against Nuclear Iran said in its letter to Oaktree Capital.
The US government also has said Iranian oil sales revenue funds the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard's Quds Force, an expeditionary unit believed to be working abroad in countries like Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen to back Iranian-allied militias.

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Global Interest in Israel's Air-Launched Ballistic Missiles

This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)
This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)
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Global Interest in Israel's Air-Launched Ballistic Missiles

This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)
This handout picture released by the Israeli army on October 26, 2024, shows an Israeli fighter jet departing a hangar at an undisclosed location in Israel. (Photo by AFP)

Israel's effective use of air-launched ballistic missiles in its airstrikes against Iran is expected to pique interest elsewhere in acquiring the weapons, which most major powers have avoided in favor of cruise missiles and glide bombs.
The Israeli Army said its Oct. 26 raid knocked out Iranian missile factories and air defenses in three waves of strikes.
Researchers said that based on satellite imagery, targets included buildings once used in Iran's nuclear program, according to Reuters.
Tehran defends such targets with “a huge variety” of anti-aircraft systems, said Justin Bronk, an airpower and technology expert at London's Royal United Services Institute.
Cruise missiles are easier targets for dense, integrated air defenses than ballistic missiles are.
But ballistic missiles are often fired from known launch points, and most cannot change course in flight.
Experts say high-speed, highly accurate air-launched ballistic missiles such as the Israel Aerospace Industries Rampage get around problems facing ground-based ballistic missiles and air-launched cruise missiles - weapons that use small wings to fly great distances and maintain altitude.
“The main advantage of an ALBM over an ALCM is speed to penetrate defenses,” said Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Centre for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in California.
“The downside - accuracy - looks to have been largely solved,” he said.
Ground-launched ballistic missiles - which Iran used to attack Israel twice this year, and which both Ukraine and Russia have used since Russia's invasion in 2022 - are common in the arsenals of many countries. So, too, are cruise missiles.
Because ALBMs are carried by aircraft, their launch points are flexible, helping strike planners.
“The advantage is that being air-launched, they can come from any direction, complicating the task of defending against them,” said Uzi Rubin, a senior researcher at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, one of the architects of Israel's missile defenses.
The weapons are not invulnerable to air defenses. In Ukraine, Lockheed Martin Patriot PAC-3 missiles have repeatedly intercepted Russia's Khinzhals.
Many countries, including the United States and Britain, experimented with ALBMs during the Cold War. Only Israel, Russia and China are known to field the weapons now.
The US tested a hypersonic ALBM, the Lockheed Martin AGM-183, but it received no funding for the 2025 fiscal year.
Because it has a large arsenal of cruise missiles and other types of long-range strike weapons, Washington has otherwise shown little interest in ALBMs.
A US Air Force official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said ALBMs are not used in Air Force operations.
Raytheon's SM-6, an air-defense missile that has been repurposed for air-to-air and surface-to-surface missions, also has been tested as an air-launched anti-ship weapon, said a senior US defense technical analyst, who declined to be identified because the matter is sensitive.
In tests the missile was able to strike a small target on land representing the center of mass of a destroyer, the analyst said. Publicly, the SM-6 is not meant for air-to-ground strikes.
Because ALBMs are essentially a combination of guidance, warheads and rocket motors, many countries that have precision weapons already have the capability to pursue them, a defense industry executive said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.
“This is a clever way of taking a common set of technologies and components and turning it into a very interesting new weapon that gives them far more capability, and therefore options, at a reasonable price,” the executive said.