By Sherry Su and Rakesh Sharma (Bloomberg) —
An oil tanker carrying crude from a Russian producer that was recently sanctioned by the US has been floating off West Coast of India for two days, raising a question about whether authorities in the south Asian country will allow the vessel to deliver its cargo.
The Cordelia Moon originally planned to discharge at Vadinar on India’s west coast on Feb. 9 after loading about 1 million barrels of Urals crude from Russia’s Black Sea port of Novorossiysk Jan. 10-12, according to shipping information seen by Bloomberg. The owner of the cargo was Surgutneftegas, one of the two Russian producers sanctioned by the US on Jan. 10, the information shows.
The shipment marks the first observed arrival of Surgutneftegas barrels that loaded after a Jan. 10 cutoff imposed by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control. At least four more tankers are expected to arrive in coming days or weeks and another with oil from Gazprom Neft, the other producer sanctioned by the US, is also on the way.
There are wider signs that Russian oil is backing up rather than getting delivered, raising the prospect of disruption. Millions of barrels of crude from the country’s east are sitting on tankers, vessel tracking compiled by Bloomberg shows.
Without going into specifics, India’s oil secretary Pankaj Jain said that cargoes from sanctioned entities wouldn’t be accepted if they loaded after Jan. 10. He said he was unaware of the Cordelia Moon. The ship is not among 161 oil carriers that got blacklisted by the Office of Foreign Assets Control last month.
Surgutneftegas and Gazprom Neft didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
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