France detains Russian shadow tanker Tagor in Atlantic; Moscow calls it piracy

French naval forces, supported by Britain, intercepted the sanctioned oil tanker Tagor in open ocean sailing from Murmansk. Moscow has characterized the operation as illegal and bordering on piracy.

On the morning of May 31, French naval forces detained the oil tanker Tagor in the Atlantic Ocean — a vessel subject to sanctions from Britain, the European Union, the United States, Ukraine, and Switzerland. The operation was announced by President Emmanuel Macron, who published footage on social media of a raid landing from a helicopter onto the tanker.

«It is unacceptable for vessels to circumvent international sanctions, violate maritime law, and finance the war that Russia has been waging against Ukraine for more than four years. These vessels, which ignore even the most elementary rules of maritime navigation, also pose a threat to the environment and general security,» Macron wrote. According to him, the operation was conducted «in strict compliance with maritime law» with the support of several partners, including Britain.

Tagor is a 252-meter-long and 44-meter-wide oil tanker sailing under the flag of Madagascar. The vessel left the port of Murmansk in early May and was observed near Norway's western coast at the end of the month. According to Russia's foreign ministry, the tanker was traveling from Murmansk to Cameroon «practically without cargo.» The exact destination of the vessel at the moment of interception has not been definitively established. The tanker's captain is reportedly a Russian citizen; according to available information, he repeatedly refused to comply with orders from the French Navy. The crew is charged with «failure to provide proof of the vessel's nationality,» «absence of a flag,» and «failure to comply with a stop order.» On June 2, the detained vessel arrived in the Douarnenez bay in western France, where it was anchored.

Moscow responded harshly. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that Russia considers the detention illegal and bordering on piracy, emphasizing that the country «will continue to take measures to ensure the safety of its cargo.» The Russian embassy in Paris reported that the French side had not notified the diplomatic mission about the planned operation. Official Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova warned that «France's transfer of the fight against such vessels to open sea spaces, where freedom of navigation applies, could prove costly for all global maritime commerce.» Russian state media, in turn, portrayed the incident as one-sided aggressive actions by the West, while independent sources pointed to the systemic nature of sanctions violations by shadow fleet vessels.

The detention of Tagor is another episode in growing Western pressure on Russia's shadow fleet — a network of vessels that, according to European governments, enables Moscow to export oil in circumvention of international sanctions imposed following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. France has conducted similar operations before; the current interception in the open Atlantic Ocean, rather than in territorial or exclusive economic waters, gives the matter special precedential significance from the standpoint of international maritime law.