WP: Russian oil enters Greeceʼs largest refinery through Turkey

The largest oil refinery in Greece, Motor Oil Hellas, which supplies fuel for the Pentagon, receives Russian oil despite Western sanctions. Deliveries take place through Turkey.

The Washington Post writes about it.

The publication studied fuel flows between the Greek plant and the Turkish oil depot in the city of Gyortol. It turned out that over the past two years, 5.4 million barrels of oil products arrived in Dyortyol by sea, and two-thirds of them came from Russia.

After the introduction of sanctions against Russian oil products, oil supplies from Russia amounted to 2.7 million barrels, or more than 69%. During the same time, 7 million barrels were shipped from Gyortiol, of which 60% went to Motor Oil Hellas.

"I donʼt see any other possible conclusion than that Motor Oil Hellas is getting Russian oil," said fuel expert Robert Auers of research firm RBN Energy.

Analyst Viktor Katona from the Kpler company noticed that Turkish vacuum gasoil ended up in Greece. At Motor Oil Hellas, this vacuum gas oil is used for the production of aviation fuel.

Since Turkey has not imposed sanctions against Russia, its companies have the right to accept Russian fuel, but Greece is prohibited from doing so.

In turn, Motor Oil Hellas claims in a statement that the company "does not buy, process or trade Russian oil or oil products", and all imports have certificates of origin from countries that were not subject to sanctions.

Since February, more than a million barrels of aviation fuel from Motor Oil Hellas have been sent to Italy, France, Spain and Great Britain. And since March 2022, the Pentagon has signed new contracts with Motor Oil Hellas worth almost $1 billion.

• In August 2023, the United States warned Turkey of a "real risk of sanctions" if its companies continued to help Russia with oil exports.
• As Reuters writes, the United States is inspecting 100 oil tankers due to a possible violation of sanctions against Russia. Some of the tankers were unloading Russian oil from the Pacific port of Kozmino, while others were loading at the port of Primorsk in the Gulf of Finland. It is the largest US investigation since Washington and its allies imposed a price cap on Russian oil.