Voyager

Japan has received a shipment of Russian crude oil for the first time in more than two years, and it arrived on the 'Voyager', which has been sanctioned by both the United States and the European Union. The Taiyo Oil Co., a Japanese refiner based in Tokyo, has taken delivery of 600,000 barrels of Sakhalin Blend crude from the tanker. The oil was loaded from the Prigorodnoye terminal, located at the southern tip of Russia’s Sakhalin Island, on May 25, 2025. The 'Voyager' docked at the port of Kikuma on June 9 to unload the cargo. The 'Voyager', previously sailing as the 'Vernadsky Prospect', is one of 161 tankers that were sanctioned by the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) in Jan 2024 under then-President Joe Biden. The European Union blacklisted the vessel in February as part of its sanctions on Russia. Despite the sanctions, Japan has continued to receive waivers allowing the import of Sakhalin Blend crude on the grounds of national energy security. This waiver was extended in the EU’s 17th sanctions package on May 21 and remains valid until late June 2026. A separate US waiver, which permits similar activity, is set to expire on June 28, though it is generally extended as a matter of policy. The purchase was made at the request of Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). A liquefied natural gas (LNG) project backed by Japan would have been impacted if the crude oil could not be transported, as both LNG and crude are extracted together in the same process.