A shadow tanker network with suspected Iranian links has emerged as the key lifeline for Myanmar’s air force, according to a new Amnesty International investigation that tracks what the authors describe as “ghost ships” delivering jet fuel used in deadly strikes on civilians.
Amnesty’s analysis of trade, AIS, satellite and port authority data shows at least nine aviation fuel cargoes were moved into Myanmar between mid‑2024 and the end of 2025 by four product tankers operating with classic shadow fleet tactics – long AIS gaps, spoofed positions and opaque ship‑to‑ship transfers.
The NGO said Myanmar imported at least 109,604 tonnes of aviation fuel in 2025, a 69% jump on 2024 and the highest annual total since the 2021 coup, despite multiple waves of Western sanctions on the jet fuel supply chain.
“Five years after the coup, our analysis shows that the Myanmar junta continues to evade sanctions and find new ways to import the jet fuel it uses to bomb its own civilians – with 2025 being the deadliest year on record for aerial attacks since the junta takeover in 2021,” said Montse Ferrer, Amnesty’s regional research director. “Every day of inaction will cost more lives.”
Amnesty highlights four tankers -Huitong 78 (now Baraawe 1), Yong Sheng 56 (now LS Mercury), Reef (ex-Baltic Horizon) and Noble (ex-Astra) – as core to the trade. All executed jet fuel deliveries into Yangon while “going dark” on AIS during loading and/or discharge and operating from offshore hubs such as the Fujairah Offshore Anchorage Area (FOAA), a known STS hotspot.
The strongest scrutiny falls on Reef and Noble, both already designated by OFAC for lifting sanctioned Iranian product. Amnesty’s Evidence Lab matched high‑resolution imagery of Reef loitering off Bandar Abbas in September 2025 with its dimensions and layout, while the vessel’s AIS simultaneously traced box‑shaped tracks hundreds of kilometres away – a pattern the group calls clear evidence of spoofing. Noble was also imaged at Bandar Abbas between FOAA calls and Myanmar deliveries.
Commodity intelligence firm Kpler assumes all recent Reef and Noble movements into Myanmar are Iranian barrels, based on AIS, satellite, customs and trade data. Amnesty concludes that while the precise sellers remain opaque, “several indicators point to an Iran connection”, and argues that the Myanmar jet fuel chain has “gone rogue”, adopting the same playbook used by Russian, Iranian and North Korean sanctions busters.
