SANCTIONS AGAINST RUSSIA, North Korea, and Iran will continue to fail unless the global maritime flagging system is structurally reformed, according to a new report from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a London-based think tank.

The study highlights the increasing reliance of Russia and Iran on evasive tactics, such as hiding ship ownership, disabling identification systems, registering with lenient flag states and flying false flags, in order to evade detection and enforcement.

“The ease with which vessels can obtain flags without scrutiny, avoid ownership transparency and escape enforcement actions has created the conditions for an entire parallel shipping ecosystem,” wrote the report’s authors, Gonzalo Saiz and Tom Keatinge.

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