Ship managed to evade capture in the Caribbean Sea last month. He was persecuted for two weeks, during which he changed his name and began flying a Russian flag – he was “part of a Russian-Iranian sanctions evasion axis that fuels terrorism, conflict and suffering from the Middle East to Ukraine”
He was monitored for days, changed his name and started flying the Russian flag before being finally seized by US forces this Wednesday. The journey of Marinera – or Bella 1, its original name – in recent weeks seems worthy of an action film, co-produced by the US and the UK.
The international press describes it as a “huge and rusty” oil tanker, 300 meters long, but essential in the ghost fleet used by Russia, Iran and Venezuela to circumvent Western oil sanctions.
Originally named “Bella 1”, the ship was sanctioned by the US in the summer of 2024 on charges of transporting illicit cargo for Hezbollah, a Lebanese militant group backed by Iran.
Last month, Donald Trump imposed a “total and complete blockade” of all sanctioned oil tankers entering and leaving Venezuela, in an action seen at the time as an escalation of tensions with the then Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro. According to the Guardian, the Bella 1 managed to evade capture in the Caribbean Sea at that time, when the US Coast Guard unsuccessfully tried to board it as it headed towards Venezuela.
The US continued to pursue the ship as it headed northeast. At one point, according to the international press, the tanker’s crew “hurriedly painted” a Russian flag on the vessel’s hull, claiming Russian protection, and turned off its transponders while sailing.
The ship later appeared in Russia’s official ship register under a new name – Marinera – and Russia filed a formal diplomatic request demanding the US to end the high-sea pursuit.
“Seizing a Russian-flagged ship on the high seas is disregarding Russia’s claims of exclusive jurisdiction over the vessel,” Craig Kennedy, associate researcher at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard University, explains to the Guardian, who believes this was the crew’s strategy to fend off the Americans.
But the pursuit continued, now with the support of the United Kingdom, which, according to the British Ministry of Defense, provided “pre-planned operational support, including the provision of bases, to US military assets” to monitor the Marinera as it headed north and passed the British coast. In recent weeks, US P-8 surveillance aircraft have been deployed to the British Royal Air Force (RFA) Mildenhall base in Suffolk, England, and an RFA Tideforce ship has been mobilized.
The tanker was eventually seized this Wednesday morning, while heading to Russia. In a statement cited by Sky News, British Defense Secretary John Healey stressed that Marinera was “part of a Russian-Iranian axis of sanctions evasion that fuels terrorism, conflict and suffering from the Middle East to Ukraine.”
“It was a ship from the parallel Venezuelan fleet that transported oil subject to sanctions,” White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt later said, adding that “there was a court order of seizure against the crew.”
According to the New York Times, Russia even sent a warship to escort the oil tanker, but when the Coast Guard approached the ship this Wednesday morning, it did not find any Russian vessels in the area, avoiding the possibility of an armed confrontation between the two countries, according to two US officials not identified by the newspaper. The Marinera was not transporting oil at the time it was approached.
The & , in coordination with the today announced the seizure of
the M/V Bella 1 for violations of U.S. sanctions. The vessel was seized in the North Atlantic pursuant to a warrant issued by a U.S. federal court after being tracked by USCGC Munro.— U.S. European Command (@US_EUCOM)
From Craig Kennedy’s perspective, the Russians have fallen into their own strategy, having been surprised by the US attack on Venezuela, which culminated in the capture of Nicolás Maduro. After hailing the “success” of this operation, Trump promised to maintain the blockade to further pressure Venezuela’s interim government. “Russia tried to gain an advantage by intervening in the American blockade”, assumes the investigator. “And that turned against the Russians.”
Also this Wednesday morning, the US Coast Guard intercepted a second oil tanker linked to Venezuela, the Panama-flagged M/T Sophia, in Latin American waters. The Southern Command of the Armed Forces described it as a “stateless, sanctioned tanker belonging to the clandestine fleet”.
According to Reuters, the ship had left Venezuela earlier this month and is part of a ghost fleet that transports Venezuelan oil to China in “clandestine mode”, that is, with the transponder turned off.
