Kuala Lumpur: The illegal transfer of crude oil in the Malacca Strait is increasing, with syndicates refining their tactics of ship-to-ship (STS) transfers to avoid detection, the head of the Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency, the country's coastguard, said on Thursday.
These syndicates, which had previously operated in the waters around Johor state, are shifting their area of operations further north of the Malacca Strait, director-general Admiral Mohd Rosli Abdullah said in an interview with local daily New Straits Times.
"Among the tactics employed by these syndicates are the use of 'shadow fleet' vessels, where ships operate under obscure ownership structures and switch off or manipulate their Automatic Identification System (AIS) to avoid tracking. They also conduct operations at night or during low-visibility conditions, use false identities, change vessel names and rely on fake documentation," he said.
Rosli said that although the number of reported cases fell to near-zero detection last year, this did not indicate absence but reflected the ability of these syndicates to adapt and evade enforcement, with illegal STS activities commonly orchestrated by organized criminal syndicates equipped with sophisticated logistical networks and technological support, making them more adaptive and harder to detect compared with conventional enforcement approaches.
Rosli said any failure by Malaysia to act against illegal STS activities that may involve sanctioned parties could create a negative perception of the country's maritime integrity and affect its global reputation.
