Speech by Minister Berendsen at the expert meeting of the NB8++

Your Excellencies,
Ladies and gentlemen,

Good morning, everyone. It’s an honour to welcome you here today. We find ourselves in a particularly fitting venue: a storehouse built in the 17th century for the Admiralty of Amsterdam. This was no ordinary storehouse. Alongside ropes, anchors and compasses, they also stored rifles and cannons here. So that ships could be armed and equipped at short notice in times of crisis. 

Recognising its strategic importance, the famous Dutch poet Joost van den Vondel compared this building in 1658 to a hippocampus, the mythical sea horse that pulled Neptune’s chariot. Rising from the waters, ready to defend maritime routes against hostile powers and pirates, Vondel said it contained enough weaponry to fill several Trojan horses.  Yet it was kept reined in: Vondel noted that the Admiralty of his time operated ‘preferably by law, rather than by the sword’. This echoed the spirit of Hugo Grotius, who had laid the foundations for international maritime law in 1609 with his Mare Liberum. 

But laws were not always respected. And, just like today, that meant the law had to be enforced. In fact, that’s why we’ve gathered in this historic place.

In the 17th century, one of the biggest challenges was dealing with ships that misused official letters of marque: these were documents authorising private vessels to attack and seize enemy ships. Today we face a large Russian shadow fleet that also operates behind a veneer of legality. And this demands a firm and coordinated enforcement response.

We must act to prevent vessels from sailing under false flags and we must ensure the maritime safety of large oil tankers. Europe cannot allow the freedom of navigation on the world’s seas to be abused by shadow-fleet vessels, leaving European coastal states to bear the consequences when things go wrong at sea.

The stakes are high. The roughly 1,100, often ageing, tankers significantly bolster Russia’s capacity to continue its war in Ukraine. According to estimates by the Finnish Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), this fleet generates around 73 billion euros in annual revenue for the Kremlin. This is highly problematic for Ukraine, but also for all of us. Because as long as Ukraine is not safe, neither are we. 

Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022 made it painfully clear that, in the absence of an effective countervailing force, Moscow feels free to continue its aggression. Ukraine has experienced the consequences first-hand: widespread devastation and immense human suffering.

Our countries face hybrid threats: the shadow fleet brings risks of espionage as well as potential damage to vulnerable but crucial underwater infrastructure. These risks are evident in the Baltic Sea and the Swedish-Finnish maritime region, but also in the North Sea.  All of these developments are placing significant and increasing strain on our security architecture, within NATO and the European Union. There is no time to waste. We must respond. 

It’s good to note that important steps have already been taken, and we can build on them. Fortunately we recognised at an early stage that, in response to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, military support alone would not be enough.  From the outset, efforts to undermine, delay and disrupt Russia’s revenue model through EU sanctions have been a crucial second pillar. The 20 sanctions packages effectively target key enablers of Russia’s war effort, including its shadow fleet.

As a result, the Russian economy is under structural strain: it may be resilient in the short term, but over the longer term it will become less efficient and more costly to sustain. The impact of sanctions lies both in the constant erosion of capacity as well as the disruption of supply chains and financial flows.  While Russia deploys tactics to circumvent sanctions, including through the shadow fleet, our response has been innovative, in an effort to keep tightening the noose. And the longer and more consistently sanctions are applied, the greater their structural impact will be on Russia’s ability to sustain its war. So, it’s crucial that we fully uphold the sanctions, not least with regard to the shadow fleet.

In this context, the Netherlands is pursuing three priorities.

The first is our unwavering efforts to place as many vessels as possible on the sanctions list. And: let’s cast the net wide. The listing should, for example, also include vessels associated with the Iranian oil tycoon Hossein Shamkhani. Because there are clear links between the Russian and Iranian shadow fleets, as was recently demonstrated by Belgium’s boarding of the Ethera.

Second: our continued efforts towards broad-based sanctions that target the entire ‘ecosystem’ of the fleet, including major oil suppliers such as Rosneft and Lukoil, as well as insurers and intermediaries. 

Third: reducing the size of the shadow fleet itself by tackling vessels that operate under false flags or pose threats to maritime safety in European waters. In concrete terms, this means working to limit the number of new vessels becoming part of the shadow fleet and to facilitate the dismantling and scrapping of existing ones. The upcoming 21st sanctions package offers good opportunities to make progress on all these points. 

I want to underline that the various theatres of war around the globe are becoming increasingly interconnected. The efforts of the Netherlands, together with other member states, to address the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, are therefore also an important part of our response to Russia’s war in Ukraine. Restoring freedom of navigation in the Strait will reduce energy prices, erode Russia’s ability to finance its war, and increase the impact of our sanctions on Russia. We will continue to rely on each other in all these efforts, both as NB8++ and within NATO, the EU and the UN.

Together, we can make maximum use of the scope offered by international and national law. And support one another in adapting national legislation, as the Netherlands is currently doing. Our key objective is to make the use of shadow fleet vessels so unattractive that shipowners will be effectively imposing a blockade on themselves. 

Ladies and gentlemen,

Gathered here in Vondel’s mythical ‘sea horse’, we must be ready to spring into action. This building reminds us that the sea has always been, for all our countries, both a great source of prosperity and a source of danger. Time and again, we’ve had to confront those dangers in a responsible and effective way. I’m convinced that we are now facing challenges of historic proportions. And they demand an effective and coordinated response.

At the same time, history has shown that our capabilities are great, so I’m confident we’re equal to the task. I wish you all productive discussions.

Thank you!