Overview
- U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said U.S. forces boarded and seized the stateless supertanker MT Davina in the Indian Ocean during an operation carried out without reported incident.
- The Davina, also called Lenore, was tracked off Sri Lanka and was carrying a near-full cargo in a ship that can hold about two million barrels of crude.
- U.S. officials and court filings treat the vessel as part of Iran’s “ghost fleet” used to disguise shipments and justify a right-of-visit interdiction because the ship was stateless and under U.S. sanctions.
- The boarding follows a string of recent enforcement steps, including U.S. Treasury OFAC sanctions on Iranian crypto platforms such as Nobitex on June 2 to block digital routes for sanction evasion.
- The action fits inside a broader U.S. naval campaign that began in April to restrict Iran’s sea trade, a squeeze that has cut reported Iranian exports and has raised risks for regional shipping, insurers, and Asian buyers of discounted crude.