November 24, 2025 • 22 mins
The Cook Islands’ flag has flown from more than a hundred oil tankers implicated in illicitly trading Russian and Iranian oil.
A special Herald investigation has revealed that it’s sparked alarm from foreign governments – with New Zealand diplomats fielding concerns from Helsinki and London.
Our Foreign Minister Winston Peters has labelled the issue “alarming and infuriating”.
So, what is the link between the Baltic Sea and the Pacific? And how has this been allowed to happen?
Today on The Front Page, NZ Herald business investigations reporter Matt Nippert is with us to explain what it all means – and why we should care.
Follow The Front Page on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
You can read more about this and other stories in the New Zealand Herald, online at nzherald.co.nz, or tune in to news bulletins across the NZME network.
Host: Chelsea Daniels
Editor/Producer: Richard Martin
Producer: Jane Yee
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Kiota.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. The Cook
Island's flag has flown from more than one hundred oil
tankers implicated in illicitly trading Russian and Iranian oil. A
(00:26):
special Herald investigation has revealed its sparked alarm from foreign governments,
with New Zealand diplomats fielding concerns from Helsinki and London.
Our Foreign Minister Winston Peters has labeled the issue alarming
and infuriating. So what is the link between the Baltic
(00:47):
Sea and the Pacific and how has this been allowed
to happen?
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Today?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
On the Front Page ends at Herald Business Investigations reporter
Matt Nippett is with us to explain what it all
means and why.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
We should care.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
First off, Matt, what's the significance of flag flying on
a ship? So, you know, I assume that that's just
a requirement of the high seas. Do you have to
have a flag flying on your ship somewhere?
Speaker 1 (01:16):
I guess the simple way to explain it, As you know,
cars need license plates and ships need flags. Of course,
you know when you're driving your car, you don't, particularly
in New Zealand, you don't tend to cross borders unless
you've gone a long way out into the tessmen see whoever,
ships by the very nature sort of international vessels. I'll
start off in one country in one port, and you
(01:38):
travel through the waters of many others and probably end
up somewhere else. So it doesn't necessarily have to be
tied to either end. Also, there is this issue of
being an international waters you know, when whose law replies
in there and turns out if you're on board a
ship and intenationia waters, the flag states laws apply. Flag
states also have a crucial role in determining like employment
(01:59):
conditions for stuff those of the crew aboard the vessel,
and also maintaining safety standards. So it's a bit of
a like a license plate and a waft right.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
And so that's why you see, you know, sometimes if
something happens on a cruise ship, they we always see
them talking about what flag does it fly under or something,
because that constituents what laws are going to be.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Yeah, that's right, And so there's a whole a lot
of different countries offer sort of flags of flag services.
I mean, the biggest one in the world is Panama.
You know, Panamas doesn't own a lot of ships. Obviously
they've got the Panama can now and lots of ships
go through, but also outfits countries like the Marshall Island
and Palau. They sort of run some bustling little ship
(02:44):
registration services and have built like legal frameworks around that.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
What first alerted you to the fact that there were
Cook Islands flags hanging around the Baltics.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Well, I'd sort of picked up i think on social media.
They've been the odd mention of you know, certain cock
Island's flag vessels had been sanctioned. You know, it was
one at a time, but it was That was a
case of the Eagles on Christmas Day last year, which
was an oil tanker that left left Russia in the
Baltic and was sailing down past Finland and then it
(03:16):
dragged its anchor and cut a very important power cable
between Estonia and Finland. The vessel was arrested and its
crew were later prosecuted for sabotage. That really raised my
eyebrows because this is where these stories seen to move
from the very sort of niche shipping industry news pages
and there had been an alarming series of reports about
(03:37):
the size of the Cock Island fleet by this point,
but I hadn't paid that much attention to it. But
the eglest became like an international diplomatic incident, and I
think my further reporting revealed that, you know, the authorities
in Helsinki were calling up people in Wenington saying, why
is the realm of New Zealand involved in this sort
of activity? And I think it was news to the beehive.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
If the Eagles situation hadn't happened, would we have even
known about this or would they have continued with their
strong upwards trajectory of expanding its fleet.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Well By the time the Eagles incident happened that the
Cooks had been under serious pressure diplomatically. I think a
lot of this has been happening behind closed doors. It
has been raised by Wellington repeatedly with the Cocks and
the Cock Island shadow fleet operations to Peter have peaked
in sort of mid twenty twenty four, so it was
declining by this point. Would it have come what I
(04:29):
have looked into it, I probably wouldn't have. You know,
it was the trigger for me to start digging deeper.
But as I mentioned, it had been noticed by those
and sort of interesting industries and fields, but it wasn't
quite in the public consciousness.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
So when we talk about a shadow fleet or how
they would have been able to use these flags. If
I had a ship and I wanted to run oil
from Russia to through the Baltic say and do I
look at is there like a price list of flags
that I can look up and say, Oh, the cook
Islands costs X amount.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
I'll just give them that money. I can fly their flag.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
Well, there is no public price list.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
Yeah, I'm searching around on the dark through my comne.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
The way the shadow it works, you know, you just
to talk about if you have a ship, well that's
your problem. What you'd want to do is decide you
wanted to ship oil from Russia, and you'd buy the
oldest ship you could find because it'd be the cheapest,
and then you'd find a place to register it. Sorry
to flag it cheaply. I understand the Cooks have been
they're sort of more at the budget end of the
(05:34):
flagging of the flag authorities. So yeah, you get it registered,
you'd try to find an insurer that would cover you,
and then I guess you'd hope you didn't get caught,
because you know, since the invasion of Ukraine, you know,
exports Russian oil have been if not outright banned, you know,
very heavily monitor I think there was a price cap
at some point, but I mean I have read some
(05:57):
international reports on this that the profits to be made
aid from this trade as such that you know, your
old oil tanker and it needs to make two or
three return trips and you've paid for the boat.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Oh wow, how much does a boat go for?
Speaker 2 (06:10):
If I'm looking at it, I'm assuming that these boats
are like what decades old?
Speaker 1 (06:14):
Yeah, we are. The most of the Shadow Fleet are
so obvious and towards the end of their lives sort
of several decades old. I mean, you know you'd be
looking at you know, fifty million enough, depending on how
see whether you wanted it, I guess.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
In terms of these flags, so you've got your ship,
you've got your flag from the cooks, you've registered, and
you've got the insurance. In terms of doing all of that,
you're doing something presumably illegal anyway. So transporting Russian oil
for instance, that has heavy sanctions on it, why bother
(06:51):
to go the full mile and get yourself a flag.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Well, you have to have a flag to be insured,
and often ports will not let you into their waters
if you're not insured, because you know what happens if
you're ancient leaking oil tanker. You know, our Sunday springs
a leak. Someone's got to cover that and the worre
some concerns raised by m FAT to the Cooks that
are in the case of where insurance is avoided, it's
(07:17):
possible a claim can be taken against the flag state,
which you can imagine for the cook Olins, whether it's
you know, annual government budget of one hundred and fifty
million dollars, if you start looking at something like an
Exon Valdez type multi billion dollar oil spill would be existential,
It'll be a problem and inevitably would also be a
problem for New Zealand.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
So the people and the cooks who are selling these
rights are taking a massive gamble here.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Then, ah, well, I guess you know there are they
They rely on their clientele to follow the rules and
ensure they're ensured, But to what extent do they conduct
due diligence that these people are actually undertaking these steps
and what sort of risk profile do they have is
really an open question and having a look at their
(08:02):
activities over the last two or three years, yeah, they
really need to answer those.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Well, let's have a look at the numbers.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
How many ships have been part of the Cook Islands
flagged fleet in recent years.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Well, I was did considerable piece of analysis money looking
at their tanker fleet. So before the invasion of Ukraine
they sort of had about sexty vessels. Most of them
were small, sort of sort of more coastal trading. However,
from that period they signed up over one hundred new vessels.
Most of them are really really large oil tankers. And
(08:37):
you know, there's a graph of my story and you
can see it. It trebles in size in two years
and then rapidly declines as the ships get repeatedly sectioned.
So you know, when you're talking about you know, one hundred,
one hundred large oil tankers trading continguers they for several years,
that's a lot of oil.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
And also tell me the flags popped up in other
situations as well recently.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Yes, so the you know, the key part of mine
elsis on sort of recent activities with Iranian and Russian
shadow fleets. But you know, there have been dubious vessels
registered to the Cooks, you know, over the last decade
and a half. In fact, during the entire period of
its operation, when I found a Russian oligarchs super yacht
was seized, you know, in one of the first waves
(09:21):
of sanctions that came out of the US because its
owner was closely associated with Fedomir Putin. They also found
a Swedish six trafficker who was in a Philippines prison
taking well he wasn't taking position, his British Virgin Arms
company was taking position of a million dollar yacht, you know,
also with the Cock Island's flag. And finally I also
(09:41):
found the Cooks were offering both flagging and licenses to
carry guns and ammunition to a Russian mercenary outfit that
you know later sort of split and became the Wagner
Group in terms of.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
So these are rules highly.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Ran situations for the Cook Islands flag to be involved with.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
How has this been made to happen?
Speaker 2 (10:06):
So I understand that the Cook Islands military, you know,
the shipping fleet, the company that looks after that is privatized.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yeah, so the Cooks had been running flagging services started
in the nineties. They weren't doing very well. It was
costing more money to run than they were getting into
a couple of lawyers and the Cooks, both former solicitor
generals that help write the laws that governess, they made
a bed to set up a private company and run
(10:37):
it and try to drive traffic that way. Yeah, and
that sort of close relationship between government and this private
entity have has continued. I mean, one of the founding
directors went back into government after founding the Shipping Register
and became Foreign Secretary. His son has taken over his
father's position in that company and he's also Foreign Secretary
(10:59):
of Maritime Cooklands. While also, yeah, it's a very cozy
relationship that would really raise eyebrows in New Zealand. But
I am told that, you know, things happen in the
in the Cook Islands that wouldn't happen in New Zealand.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
And in terms of the money, I understand it's quite
difficult to track down what kind of figures have we
seen from potentially how much this company is making from
renting out its flag.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
Well, one thing that is quite clear is the Cook
Island's government isn't getting very much out of this. I
think initially when it was set up in two thousand,
they were going to sort of split revenues sort of equally. However,
Maritime Cooklans found it pretty heavy going and there was
an agreement struck that sees just an annual fee paid
to the government and that typically has been around you know,
forty fifty thousand dollars, so not a lot in terms
(11:47):
of how much the Maritime Cook Garlands is making. You know,
they're a private company registered in the Cooks that I've
got no obligation to file reports, so we don't know
for sure, but i'd estimate, you know, their typical annual
revenues will be in the low million. And working out
how much was made from this recent surgeon so the
Jubius oil tanker registration, well that's a very interesting question,
(12:08):
but I imagine it's you know, again probably in the
low millions. So it's not a huge business story, but
you know, pretty substantial sums for place.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Like the Cooks well and especially when you've got diplomats
in Helsinki calling diplomats in Wellington being.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Like, what's this, what's this? What's going on here?
Speaker 2 (12:28):
And then the embarrassment of us not having any answers.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Well, yes, we I have seen the oas and you
know there there were still in questions asked to the
Cooks saying what is going on here? And seems to
be that there was a distinct reluctance to discuss maritime
cooklands by the cook Ilans government. Yeah, huge reputational risks.
I mean the way it's been put to me by
diplomats is that New Zealand's taken an active stance on
(12:54):
the war in Ukraine. We are providing military training, support,
economic system it's to Ukraine, while at the same time
and also past their own sanction tact targeting Russia, while
at the same time part of the realm of New
Zealand was sort of flagging a large play the tankers
to work for Russia to allow them to raise revenues
to allow them to continue the other side of the war.
(13:16):
It's you know, you don't want to be funding both
sides of war unless you know you're a really dubious
arms dealer. And I think New Zealand is not hangling
for that.
Speaker 3 (13:31):
If I were in a league and I'm going back
to this.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Because I don't I also don't want people thinking that
I am actually interested in becoming an illegal oil dealer
in the Baltics.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
But I was trying to put myself in those shoes.
And on one hand, I'm.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
Not sure if I would choose the Cook Islands flag
because it seems so out of place, right, But on
the same time, it's inocuousness. It's is what's attractive about it.
People would look at that flag and think, oh, that's interesting.
I not know where the flag has come from.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 (14:06):
I think I get what you're saying. Yeah, but it
is worth noting that. I think, as I mentioned earlier,
a lot of small states run flagging services. So the
most common flag you'll see on boats is that of Panama.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
Do we have any idea how much Panama gets?
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Uh, that's a bit more. That's I think their businesses
several orders of magnitude larger than the cocks, So, I mean,
it's a proper medium sized business.
Speaker 3 (14:31):
And you've spoken to Starboard Maritime Intelligence. What do they do?
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Well? They were in New Zealand start up looking at
sort of just basically trying to track every ship on
the ocean at once in real time. Ships are required
to have a little transponder that's on that's supposed to
prevent collisions. That will you know, if you're close to
another vessel, particularly at night, you know you don't want
to oil tankers crashing into each other. But these transponders,
(14:58):
you know, they could be turned off, can be jammed,
they can be programmed to submit like false location data.
So what Starboard does is also messures that with satellite imagery.
And it's amazing to see what technology has done now
that you can get close sort of not quite real time,
but quite recent satellite imagery, and you can look at
(15:21):
part of an ocean where a transponder ping is coming
and you know, sometimes there's not a boat there, which
is usually good indicator that transponders have been messed with.
So what Starboard does are they fuse all the stuff
with ship ownership information, insurer information, flagging information and try
to build like a risk profile again based on sort
(15:42):
of the age of a vessel and where it is
and how dubious tracking information has been. And they've been
providing that data to national governments and large logistics companies
for the last couple of years. I think they just
recently raised twenty three million dollars and Series A funding,
So they're a company to keep an eye out for.
(16:05):
And they've done amazing work for me on this story.
They were able to build me a real time map
of the Cocolan's tanker fleet, and I've published some of
those tracks and they're pretty amazing to see just all
those really solid white lines coming out of Saint Peter's
Big in Crimea and winding their way around to China.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Yeah, and it's interesting as well how they because they're
obviously living and breathing this data and seeing where all
of these ships are going. Do you think that the
general New Zealand public would be shocked to see maybe
a map like the one that you published this morning.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Well, I think that Matt tells the story. And again,
while they've been sort of whispers and traces of this
that have come out over the last few years, when
you're able to when you ask the question, well, what
was the Cocolan inflict doing when this these dubious registrations
were at their peak, it's very clear what they were shipping.
Russian oil because you know, you don't take any do
(16:59):
or you know, take a full oil tanker to Russia
to offload oil. I mean, Russia's an oil exporting countries,
So there's it's very hard to sort of explain that
away as a couple of rogue operators. What looks like everything.
Almost every single tanker the Cooks had flagged was engaged
in this trade.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
And the fleet's gone down though since then.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yep, they've dramatically prone. It s actually smaller than it
was in twenty two hour.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Are they getting a bit too much attention?
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Well, they were certainly getting pression from Wrllington. I think
New Zealand had signed up to an initiative from the
United Kingdom to crack down on the shadow fleet. And
someone went and checked and the Cook Island register indeed
had a bunch of sectioned vessels on it, and there
were some queries as to why they're all there, Why
they're all there, why they're still there Maritime Cook Islands,
I think in February of this year decided, you know,
(17:50):
the risks were too great and they were no longer
going to allow their vessels to operate at the Baltic
and by May they decided, actually any Russian oil it's
just too difficult to risk. And so you know, now
that I think the only two sanctioned vessels that remain
on the Cooks register are you know, the Ego Less
that arrested tanker suspected of sabotage, and that's at the
(18:12):
request of authorities in Finland, you know, who don't want
this vessel going off the books. And also the Oligat
super yacht that was seized in twenty twenty two. You know,
the FBI thought there was an absolutely great score, but
unfortunately that's got tied up in a legal dispute and
the US government is paying a million and a half
dollars just in maintenance. Here's a hot fear of viewers.
(18:35):
Do not buy a super yot unless you can burn
a million dollars a month.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Well yeah, well, I'll note that down for next time.
Speaker 3 (18:42):
The lott of Girt's up to fifty five million. What's
Winston Peters said about all this?
Speaker 1 (18:48):
He's issued some very strong commentary on this. I described
the Cockland's flagging, particularly of the Russian shadow Fleet, as
alarming and infuriating. I've seen about this predate the sort
of big China issue that blew up between New Zealand
and the Cooks earlier this year.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
I think quite salty.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Oh it's beyond that. It's ended into a deep freeze now.
I mean, so there's a range of issues that New
Zealand has grown increasingly frustrated over and basically hasn't seen
any backdown at all from the Cox because I mean,
the Cook Island is left in this very awkward position
that it's not a dependency. You know, it's not run
from Wellington. It's also not independent, so it gets a
(19:27):
lot of local autonomy. It can run its own local
services and justice system, but foreign policy is supposed to
be sort of overseen by New Zealand, and that's been
the real tension point where you know, running its own
shipping registry is sort of in that gray area, and
signing deals with China also in that area. And so
(19:48):
from what I understand, the relationship between Rawatong and Wellington
is the worst it's ever been. There haven't been any
formal meetings between ministers on both sides for over a year.
Speaker 3 (19:58):
Where to next, you reckon.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Yeah, well, the shipping industry, I mean they've cleaned up
there act, but huge questions remain as to how they
could allow themselves to be effectively exploited by Russia and
Iranian interest to sort of export you know, billions and
billions and billions of dollars worth of oil.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
But at the same time it kind of sounds like
the Cook Islands government isn't getting enough from this privatized
company as well.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
No, getting very little. They did defend themselves and said like, well,
the company does employed twenty people in Rawata, some of
them pay tax. I mean, it's yeah, I mean, it's
my own opinion at the risk sort of reward equation
here is a bit too heavy on the former in
(20:47):
terms of the relationship with between the Zealand and the Cooks.
I mean, there needs to be there needs to be
some dialogue down the line. But I think the Cooks
need to have a think about whether they want to
be independent or not. Because if they want to, you know,
print their own passports and become like a dodgy haven
for crypto and run their own shipping registry as they want,
(21:09):
then you know they can do that as an independent state,
although you know it would be quite difficult giving only
seventeen thousand people live in RaRo to sustaining that, but
you know there are some micro states out there.
Speaker 3 (21:21):
Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
Matt, thanks for having me, Chelsea.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
at enzadherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is
produced by Jane Ye and Richard Martin, who is also
our editor. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to the Front Page
on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts, and tune
(21:50):
in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.
Kiota.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a
daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. The Cook
Island's flag has flown from more than one hundred oil
tankers implicated in illicitly trading Russian and Iranian oil. A
(00:26):
special Herald investigation has revealed its sparked alarm from foreign governments,
with New Zealand diplomats fielding concerns from Helsinki and London.
Our Foreign Minister Winston Peters has labeled the issue alarming
and infuriating. So what is the link between the Baltic
(00:47):
Sea and the Pacific and how has this been allowed
to happen?
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Today?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
On the Front Page ends at Herald Business Investigations reporter
Matt Nippett is with us to explain what it all
means and why.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
We should care.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
First off, Matt, what's the significance of flag flying on
a ship? So, you know, I assume that that's just
a requirement of the high seas. Do you have to
have a flag flying on your ship somewhere?
Speaker 1 (01:16):
I guess the simple way to explain it, As you know,
cars need license plates and ships need flags. Of course,
you know when you're driving your car, you don't, particularly
in New Zealand, you don't tend to cross borders unless
you've gone a long way out into the tessmen see whoever,
ships by the very nature sort of international vessels. I'll
start off in one country in one port, and you
(01:38):
travel through the waters of many others and probably end
up somewhere else. So it doesn't necessarily have to be
tied to either end. Also, there is this issue of
being an international waters you know, when whose law replies
in there and turns out if you're on board a
ship and intenationia waters, the flag states laws apply. Flag
states also have a crucial role in determining like employment
(01:59):
conditions for stuff those of the crew aboard the vessel,
and also maintaining safety standards. So it's a bit of
a like a license plate and a waft right.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
And so that's why you see, you know, sometimes if
something happens on a cruise ship, they we always see
them talking about what flag does it fly under or something,
because that constituents what laws are going to be.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Yeah, that's right, And so there's a whole a lot
of different countries offer sort of flags of flag services.
I mean, the biggest one in the world is Panama.
You know, Panamas doesn't own a lot of ships. Obviously
they've got the Panama can now and lots of ships
go through, but also outfits countries like the Marshall Island
and Palau. They sort of run some bustling little ship
(02:44):
registration services and have built like legal frameworks around that.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
What first alerted you to the fact that there were
Cook Islands flags hanging around the Baltics.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Well, I'd sort of picked up i think on social media.
They've been the odd mention of you know, certain cock
Island's flag vessels had been sanctioned. You know, it was
one at a time, but it was That was a
case of the Eagles on Christmas Day last year, which
was an oil tanker that left left Russia in the
Baltic and was sailing down past Finland and then it
(03:16):
dragged its anchor and cut a very important power cable
between Estonia and Finland. The vessel was arrested and its
crew were later prosecuted for sabotage. That really raised my
eyebrows because this is where these stories seen to move
from the very sort of niche shipping industry news pages
and there had been an alarming series of reports about
(03:37):
the size of the Cock Island fleet by this point,
but I hadn't paid that much attention to it. But
the eglest became like an international diplomatic incident, and I
think my further reporting revealed that, you know, the authorities
in Helsinki were calling up people in Wenington saying, why
is the realm of New Zealand involved in this sort
of activity? And I think it was news to the beehive.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
If the Eagles situation hadn't happened, would we have even
known about this or would they have continued with their
strong upwards trajectory of expanding its fleet.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Well By the time the Eagles incident happened that the
Cooks had been under serious pressure diplomatically. I think a
lot of this has been happening behind closed doors. It
has been raised by Wellington repeatedly with the Cocks and
the Cock Island shadow fleet operations to Peter have peaked
in sort of mid twenty twenty four, so it was
declining by this point. Would it have come what I
(04:29):
have looked into it, I probably wouldn't have. You know,
it was the trigger for me to start digging deeper.
But as I mentioned, it had been noticed by those
and sort of interesting industries and fields, but it wasn't
quite in the public consciousness.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
So when we talk about a shadow fleet or how
they would have been able to use these flags. If
I had a ship and I wanted to run oil
from Russia to through the Baltic say and do I
look at is there like a price list of flags
that I can look up and say, Oh, the cook
Islands costs X amount.
Speaker 3 (05:03):
I'll just give them that money. I can fly their flag.
Speaker 1 (05:05):
Well, there is no public price list.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
Yeah, I'm searching around on the dark through my comne.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
The way the shadow it works, you know, you just
to talk about if you have a ship, well that's
your problem. What you'd want to do is decide you
wanted to ship oil from Russia, and you'd buy the
oldest ship you could find because it'd be the cheapest,
and then you'd find a place to register it. Sorry
to flag it cheaply. I understand the Cooks have been
they're sort of more at the budget end of the
(05:34):
flagging of the flag authorities. So yeah, you get it registered,
you'd try to find an insurer that would cover you,
and then I guess you'd hope you didn't get caught,
because you know, since the invasion of Ukraine, you know,
exports Russian oil have been if not outright banned, you know,
very heavily monitor I think there was a price cap
at some point, but I mean I have read some
(05:57):
international reports on this that the profits to be made
aid from this trade as such that you know, your
old oil tanker and it needs to make two or
three return trips and you've paid for the boat.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Oh wow, how much does a boat go for?
Speaker 2 (06:10):
If I'm looking at it, I'm assuming that these boats
are like what decades old?
Speaker 1 (06:14):
Yeah, we are. The most of the Shadow Fleet are
so obvious and towards the end of their lives sort
of several decades old. I mean, you know you'd be
looking at you know, fifty million enough, depending on how
see whether you wanted it, I guess.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
In terms of these flags, so you've got your ship,
you've got your flag from the cooks, you've registered, and
you've got the insurance. In terms of doing all of that,
you're doing something presumably illegal anyway. So transporting Russian oil
for instance, that has heavy sanctions on it, why bother
(06:51):
to go the full mile and get yourself a flag.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Well, you have to have a flag to be insured,
and often ports will not let you into their waters
if you're not insured, because you know what happens if
you're ancient leaking oil tanker. You know, our Sunday springs
a leak. Someone's got to cover that and the worre
some concerns raised by m FAT to the Cooks that
are in the case of where insurance is avoided, it's
(07:17):
possible a claim can be taken against the flag state,
which you can imagine for the cook Olins, whether it's
you know, annual government budget of one hundred and fifty
million dollars, if you start looking at something like an
Exon Valdez type multi billion dollar oil spill would be existential,
It'll be a problem and inevitably would also be a
problem for New Zealand.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
So the people and the cooks who are selling these
rights are taking a massive gamble here.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Then, ah, well, I guess you know there are they
They rely on their clientele to follow the rules and
ensure they're ensured, But to what extent do they conduct
due diligence that these people are actually undertaking these steps
and what sort of risk profile do they have is
really an open question and having a look at their
(08:02):
activities over the last two or three years, yeah, they
really need to answer those.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Well, let's have a look at the numbers.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
How many ships have been part of the Cook Islands
flagged fleet in recent years.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Well, I was did considerable piece of analysis money looking
at their tanker fleet. So before the invasion of Ukraine
they sort of had about sexty vessels. Most of them
were small, sort of sort of more coastal trading. However,
from that period they signed up over one hundred new vessels.
Most of them are really really large oil tankers. And
(08:37):
you know, there's a graph of my story and you
can see it. It trebles in size in two years
and then rapidly declines as the ships get repeatedly sectioned.
So you know, when you're talking about you know, one hundred,
one hundred large oil tankers trading continguers they for several years,
that's a lot of oil.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
And also tell me the flags popped up in other
situations as well recently.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Yes, so the you know, the key part of mine
elsis on sort of recent activities with Iranian and Russian
shadow fleets. But you know, there have been dubious vessels
registered to the Cooks, you know, over the last decade
and a half. In fact, during the entire period of
its operation, when I found a Russian oligarchs super yacht
was seized, you know, in one of the first waves
(09:21):
of sanctions that came out of the US because its
owner was closely associated with Fedomir Putin. They also found
a Swedish six trafficker who was in a Philippines prison
taking well he wasn't taking position, his British Virgin Arms
company was taking position of a million dollar yacht, you know,
also with the Cock Island's flag. And finally I also
(09:41):
found the Cooks were offering both flagging and licenses to
carry guns and ammunition to a Russian mercenary outfit that
you know later sort of split and became the Wagner
Group in terms of.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
So these are rules highly.
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Ran situations for the Cook Islands flag to be involved with.
Speaker 3 (10:04):
How has this been made to happen?
Speaker 2 (10:06):
So I understand that the Cook Islands military, you know,
the shipping fleet, the company that looks after that is privatized.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yeah, so the Cooks had been running flagging services started
in the nineties. They weren't doing very well. It was
costing more money to run than they were getting into
a couple of lawyers and the Cooks, both former solicitor
generals that help write the laws that governess, they made
a bed to set up a private company and run
(10:37):
it and try to drive traffic that way. Yeah, and
that sort of close relationship between government and this private
entity have has continued. I mean, one of the founding
directors went back into government after founding the Shipping Register
and became Foreign Secretary. His son has taken over his
father's position in that company and he's also Foreign Secretary
(10:59):
of Maritime Cooklands. While also, yeah, it's a very cozy
relationship that would really raise eyebrows in New Zealand. But
I am told that, you know, things happen in the
in the Cook Islands that wouldn't happen in New Zealand.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
And in terms of the money, I understand it's quite
difficult to track down what kind of figures have we
seen from potentially how much this company is making from
renting out its flag.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
Well, one thing that is quite clear is the Cook
Island's government isn't getting very much out of this. I
think initially when it was set up in two thousand,
they were going to sort of split revenues sort of equally. However,
Maritime Cooklans found it pretty heavy going and there was
an agreement struck that sees just an annual fee paid
to the government and that typically has been around you know,
forty fifty thousand dollars, so not a lot in terms
(11:47):
of how much the Maritime Cook Garlands is making. You know,
they're a private company registered in the Cooks that I've
got no obligation to file reports, so we don't know
for sure, but i'd estimate, you know, their typical annual
revenues will be in the low million. And working out
how much was made from this recent surgeon so the
Jubius oil tanker registration, well that's a very interesting question,
(12:08):
but I imagine it's you know, again probably in the
low millions. So it's not a huge business story, but
you know, pretty substantial sums for place.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Like the Cooks well and especially when you've got diplomats
in Helsinki calling diplomats in Wellington being.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Like, what's this, what's this? What's going on here?
Speaker 2 (12:28):
And then the embarrassment of us not having any answers.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Well, yes, we I have seen the oas and you
know there there were still in questions asked to the
Cooks saying what is going on here? And seems to
be that there was a distinct reluctance to discuss maritime
cooklands by the cook Ilans government. Yeah, huge reputational risks.
I mean the way it's been put to me by
diplomats is that New Zealand's taken an active stance on
(12:54):
the war in Ukraine. We are providing military training, support,
economic system it's to Ukraine, while at the same time
and also past their own sanction tact targeting Russia, while
at the same time part of the realm of New
Zealand was sort of flagging a large play the tankers
to work for Russia to allow them to raise revenues
to allow them to continue the other side of the war.
(13:16):
It's you know, you don't want to be funding both
sides of war unless you know you're a really dubious
arms dealer. And I think New Zealand is not hangling
for that.
Speaker 3 (13:31):
If I were in a league and I'm going back
to this.
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Because I don't I also don't want people thinking that
I am actually interested in becoming an illegal oil dealer
in the Baltics.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
But I was trying to put myself in those shoes.
And on one hand, I'm.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
Not sure if I would choose the Cook Islands flag
because it seems so out of place, right, But on
the same time, it's inocuousness. It's is what's attractive about it.
People would look at that flag and think, oh, that's interesting.
I not know where the flag has come from.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
Does that make sense?
Speaker 1 (14:06):
I think I get what you're saying. Yeah, but it
is worth noting that. I think, as I mentioned earlier,
a lot of small states run flagging services. So the
most common flag you'll see on boats is that of Panama.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
Do we have any idea how much Panama gets?
Speaker 1 (14:20):
Uh, that's a bit more. That's I think their businesses
several orders of magnitude larger than the cocks, So, I mean,
it's a proper medium sized business.
Speaker 3 (14:31):
And you've spoken to Starboard Maritime Intelligence. What do they do?
Speaker 1 (14:36):
Well? They were in New Zealand start up looking at
sort of just basically trying to track every ship on
the ocean at once in real time. Ships are required
to have a little transponder that's on that's supposed to
prevent collisions. That will you know, if you're close to
another vessel, particularly at night, you know you don't want
to oil tankers crashing into each other. But these transponders,
(14:58):
you know, they could be turned off, can be jammed,
they can be programmed to submit like false location data.
So what Starboard does is also messures that with satellite imagery.
And it's amazing to see what technology has done now
that you can get close sort of not quite real time,
but quite recent satellite imagery, and you can look at
(15:21):
part of an ocean where a transponder ping is coming
and you know, sometimes there's not a boat there, which
is usually good indicator that transponders have been messed with.
So what Starboard does are they fuse all the stuff
with ship ownership information, insurer information, flagging information and try
to build like a risk profile again based on sort
(15:42):
of the age of a vessel and where it is
and how dubious tracking information has been. And they've been
providing that data to national governments and large logistics companies
for the last couple of years. I think they just
recently raised twenty three million dollars and Series A funding,
So they're a company to keep an eye out for.
(16:05):
And they've done amazing work for me on this story.
They were able to build me a real time map
of the Cocolan's tanker fleet, and I've published some of
those tracks and they're pretty amazing to see just all
those really solid white lines coming out of Saint Peter's
Big in Crimea and winding their way around to China.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Yeah, and it's interesting as well how they because they're
obviously living and breathing this data and seeing where all
of these ships are going. Do you think that the
general New Zealand public would be shocked to see maybe
a map like the one that you published this morning.
Speaker 1 (16:37):
Well, I think that Matt tells the story. And again,
while they've been sort of whispers and traces of this
that have come out over the last few years, when
you're able to when you ask the question, well, what
was the Cocolan inflict doing when this these dubious registrations
were at their peak, it's very clear what they were shipping.
Russian oil because you know, you don't take any do
(16:59):
or you know, take a full oil tanker to Russia
to offload oil. I mean, Russia's an oil exporting countries,
So there's it's very hard to sort of explain that
away as a couple of rogue operators. What looks like everything.
Almost every single tanker the Cooks had flagged was engaged
in this trade.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
And the fleet's gone down though since then.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Yep, they've dramatically prone. It s actually smaller than it
was in twenty two hour.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Are they getting a bit too much attention?
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Well, they were certainly getting pression from Wrllington. I think
New Zealand had signed up to an initiative from the
United Kingdom to crack down on the shadow fleet. And
someone went and checked and the Cook Island register indeed
had a bunch of sectioned vessels on it, and there
were some queries as to why they're all there, Why
they're all there, why they're still there Maritime Cook Islands,
I think in February of this year decided, you know,
(17:50):
the risks were too great and they were no longer
going to allow their vessels to operate at the Baltic
and by May they decided, actually any Russian oil it's
just too difficult to risk. And so you know, now
that I think the only two sanctioned vessels that remain
on the Cooks register are you know, the Ego Less
that arrested tanker suspected of sabotage, and that's at the
(18:12):
request of authorities in Finland, you know, who don't want
this vessel going off the books. And also the Oligat
super yacht that was seized in twenty twenty two. You know,
the FBI thought there was an absolutely great score, but
unfortunately that's got tied up in a legal dispute and
the US government is paying a million and a half
dollars just in maintenance. Here's a hot fear of viewers.
(18:35):
Do not buy a super yot unless you can burn
a million dollars a month.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Well yeah, well, I'll note that down for next time.
Speaker 3 (18:42):
The lott of Girt's up to fifty five million. What's
Winston Peters said about all this?
Speaker 1 (18:48):
He's issued some very strong commentary on this. I described
the Cockland's flagging, particularly of the Russian shadow Fleet, as
alarming and infuriating. I've seen about this predate the sort
of big China issue that blew up between New Zealand
and the Cooks earlier this year.
Speaker 3 (19:06):
I think quite salty.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Oh it's beyond that. It's ended into a deep freeze now.
I mean, so there's a range of issues that New
Zealand has grown increasingly frustrated over and basically hasn't seen
any backdown at all from the Cox because I mean,
the Cook Island is left in this very awkward position
that it's not a dependency. You know, it's not run
from Wellington. It's also not independent, so it gets a
(19:27):
lot of local autonomy. It can run its own local
services and justice system, but foreign policy is supposed to
be sort of overseen by New Zealand, and that's been
the real tension point where you know, running its own
shipping registry is sort of in that gray area, and
signing deals with China also in that area. And so
(19:48):
from what I understand, the relationship between Rawatong and Wellington
is the worst it's ever been. There haven't been any
formal meetings between ministers on both sides for over a year.
Speaker 3 (19:58):
Where to next, you reckon.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Yeah, well, the shipping industry, I mean they've cleaned up
there act, but huge questions remain as to how they
could allow themselves to be effectively exploited by Russia and
Iranian interest to sort of export you know, billions and
billions and billions of dollars worth of oil.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
But at the same time it kind of sounds like
the Cook Islands government isn't getting enough from this privatized
company as well.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
No, getting very little. They did defend themselves and said like, well,
the company does employed twenty people in Rawata, some of
them pay tax. I mean, it's yeah, I mean, it's
my own opinion at the risk sort of reward equation
here is a bit too heavy on the former in
(20:47):
terms of the relationship with between the Zealand and the Cooks.
I mean, there needs to be there needs to be
some dialogue down the line. But I think the Cooks
need to have a think about whether they want to
be independent or not. Because if they want to, you know,
print their own passports and become like a dodgy haven
for crypto and run their own shipping registry as they want,
(21:09):
then you know they can do that as an independent state,
although you know it would be quite difficult giving only
seventeen thousand people live in RaRo to sustaining that, but
you know there are some micro states out there.
Speaker 3 (21:21):
Thanks for joining us.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
Matt, thanks for having me, Chelsea.
Speaker 2 (21:27):
That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You
can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage
at enzadherld dot co dot nz. The Front Page is
produced by Jane Ye and Richard Martin, who is also
our editor. I'm Chelsea Daniels. Subscribe to the Front Page
on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts, and tune
(21:50):
in tomorrow for another look behind the headlines.
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