Sweden releases tanker Sea Owl 1 after seven-month detention

The tanker Sea Owl 1, one of the two remaining shadow fleet vessels detained by Sweden this year, has been authorized to leave Swedish waters after nearly seven months of detention. The Swedish Transport Agency lifted the order against the vessel after confirming that it is registered under a valid flag authority, that of Equatorial Guinea.

The vessel, Chinese-owned, with a deadweight of 75,000 tonnes and built in 2007, was boarded by Swedish authorities on March 12 as it arrived from Santos, Brazil, on suspicion of sailing under a false flag and over doubts regarding its seaworthiness. At the time, the Russian master presented documentation indicating registration in the Comoros, although records showed the vessel had been operating irregularly under that flag since July 2025. In May, a second master presented papers claiming registration in Cameroon, which also proved invalid, leaving the vessel without a recognized flag State.

According to Pernilla Wallin, head of unit at the Swedish Transport Agency, it was essential to obtain reliable confirmation directly from the flag State, a process that required time and extensive work before the detention order could be lifted. For his part, Daniel Stenling, deputy head of operations at the Swedish Coast Guard, noted that a vessel disregarding international agreements by flying a false flag, not once but twice, poses serious risks to safety in the shipping lanes and along the Swedish coast, and highlighted that the vessel's stay off Sweden had been unusually long.

The Sea Owl 1 remains on the European Union's sanctions list for its involvement in Russia's oil trade, as Swedish authorities state the vessel transported petroleum products between Russia and Brazil in recent years. At the time of its detention, the vessel had reported it was bound for the Russian port of Primorsky. The Coast Guard clarified that the vessel is not suspected of violating sanctions, and that the investigations opened against two of its masters over alleged use of falsified documents have been closed.

Sweden continues to hold two other vessels under control measures: the Caffa, seized in March and still at Trelleborg, whose court case allowed Swedish courts to confirm it could be handed over to Ukraine following claims that it had transported grain stolen from occupied areas of that country, and the Jin Hui, barred from operating since May over registration and seaworthiness issues, also anchored off Trelleborg.