PHOTO: Tour 2, one of three Iranian tankers moving oil to Syria


In late June, Bloomberg News declared in large print, “How Iranian Oil Tankers Keep Syria’s War Machine Alive: Iran Has Delivered 10 Million Barrels of Oil to Assad This Year, Free of Charge”.

Despite the drama in the headline, the story was from a revelation. When Iran announced a $3.6 billion line of credit to Damascus in July 2013, it was understood that much of the aid was in the form of oil for the energy-deprived Assad regime. Syrian State media, which can be far from open in its reporting, has not been reticent in explaining that the Syrian Government has been trying for months to get an Iranian renewal of the line, to date far from successfully in a request for $4 billion.

Nor is it a shock that, despite Iranian attempts to cloak the movement, that Tehran has been shipping oil in tankers to Syrian ports on the Mediterranean. As early as June 2012, Reuters journalists wrote of a general response by the Islamic Republic to the threat of international sanctions:

Most of Iran’s 39-strong fleet of tankers is now “off-radar” after Tehran ordered captains in the National Iranian Tanker Co (NITC) to switch off the black box transponders that are used in the shipping industry to monitor vessel movements, oil industry, trading and shipping sources said.

Forbes offered specific information in January 2013 of the Tour 2, which had “made at least three circuits between US-sanctioned Iran and US-sanctioned Syria, calling at Syria last March, July and just this month”:

While it is not unusual for ships to change names and flags, the Tour 2 has gone noticeably beyond the norm. Since 2011, this tanker has sailed under three slightly varied names, and four different flags, including Malta, Bolivia, Sierra Leone and Togo, before reverting just a few weeks ago, by at least one account, to its original flag — Iran. It has also had at least three shell company owners in three different countries over the past year, at least two of those visibly linked to Iran.

In June 2014, the US State Department finally announced that Iran had been shipping oil to Syria “over the last few months”.

Bloomberg’s contribution is to bring the story up to date, with specific reference to the Tour 2:

Iran is using just three tankers to send oil to Syria, all of them classified as Suezmax tankers capable of hauling 1 million barrels each. These are the biggest class of ships that can get through the Suez Canal with a full load. The most recent delivery appears to have been made on May 26, when the tanker Amin delivered about 1 million barrels to Baniyas. A second ship, the Tour 2, arrived in Banias on June 16 and is currently anchored just offshore with an apparent delivery of crude.

The route of the Tour 2:

TOUR 2 IRAN OIL SYRIA

How Much Oil is Iran Sending?

Bloomberg’s most significant information, from “analysis of tanker movement”, is that the Iranian ships have made 10 voyages from the Islamic Republic’s islands in the Persian Gulf to Baniyas. That’s up to 10 million barrels per oil, or about 160,000 barrels per day.

The Assad regime’s oil production has fallen during the Syrian conflict from about 400,000 bpd to about 20,000, as the Islamic State has taken most of the country’s fields.

That collapse in production puts the Iranian contribution in perspective. Despite Tehran’s efforts, 10 million barrels cover less than 27 days — or about 1/6th — of the regime’s oil deficit between January and mid-June.

So Bloomberg’s concern, “It’s not clear how the U.S. or Europe would go about stopping Iran from giving its oil to Syria”, is far from the most important outcome of its discovery. Instead, the numbers highlight — barring a mysterious supplier beyond the tankers — that Tehran can do little more than curb Damascus’s oil shortage at the margins.

That is why the Assad regime is striking deals to take oil from the Islamic State, even as it fights the militants in parts — but far from all — of Syria. That is why the Government raised gasoline and diesel prices last summer. That is why there are questions about the regime’s ability to keep its military fully supplied to counter rebel offensives this year.

This is why Syrian officials are close to begging Iran, with Prime Minister al-Halqi visiting Tehran and President Assad making the appeal in Damascus to Iranian envoys, for the renewed line of credit.

But will Tehran respond? And even if it wanted to fulfil the Assad regime’s requests, can it provide enough oil to save the regime in the long run?