Overview
- The Pentagon said U.S. forces boarded the Panama-flagged Aquila II without incident in the Indian Ocean after tracking it from the Caribbean, marking the eighth tanker seized under the campaign.
- U.S. officials said the vessel violated President Donald Trump’s order targeting shipments tied to Venezuela’s sanctioned oil trade.
- Ukraine’s military intelligence and ship trackers say the tanker is linked to Russia’s shadow fleet that moves sanctioned crude, a claim reported by outlets but not independently verified in the articles.
- TankerTrackers co-founder Samir Madani reported the ship was among at least 16 that departed Venezuela in January and was followed using satellite imagery and photos.
- In a separate advisory, the U.S. Department of Transportation warned merchant vessels of recent Iranian attempts to board ships in the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman.