@UANI Iran War Shipping Update – June 12, 2026 unitedagainstnucleariran.com… Five unladen 🇮🇷-flagged tankers were spotted in international waters in the Malacca Strait west of Penang, 🇲🇾Malaysia, on 9 JUN. DERYA (IMO 9569700) was last observed on AIS on 24 MAY in the northern part of the Malacca Strait. SALINA (IMO 9357377), SERENA (IMO 9569645), HUMANITY (IMO 9180281), and DUNE (IMO 9569712) were last observed on AIS on 31 MAY also in the Malacca Strait, near One Fathom Bank off Port Klang, at the end of the Traffic Separation Scheme. @JemimaShelley @TankerTrackers @mercoglianos @ed_fin @CollinSLKoh @marcushand1 @DzirhanDefence

(Reuters) - Roughly 7 million barrels a day of oil are getting ​out of the Persian Gulf with U.S. military ‌help, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Friday at an event in Houston.

The Silent Takeover: How China is Quietly Rewriting the Borders Off Sarawak’s Coast While most of us go about our daily lives, a quiet but deeply troubling game of chess is playing out just off the coast of Sarawak, where fresh ship-tracking data reveals that China’s massive 8,000-ton supply ship, the Sansha 2 Hao, along with its armed escort cutter, the San Sha Zhi Fa 301, has packed up and left Hainan. This fleet is steaming directly south toward Beting Serupai (James Shoal / Seahorse Breakers), a completely submerged reef sitting just 45 nautical miles—about 80 kilometers—northwest of Bintulu, placing it squarely in Sarawak’s backyard. This voyage fits perfectly into Beijing's broader grey-zone tactics, which are designed to aggressively change realities on the water while staying just below the threshold of open military conflict. To enforce its sweeping nine-dash line without triggering an international military outcry, China masterfully relies on "white hull"—coast guard and municipal vessels—instead of navy warships, allowing them to bully local maritime zones under the guise of routine domestic and administrative patrols. The reason Chinese delegates and municipal fleets execute this voyage on a strict, annual basis comes down to a calculated symbolic ritual designed to manufacture legal and historical "evidence" of ownership. Because Beijing historically and geographically defines Beting Serupai (Zengmu Ansha) as the absolute southernmost point of Chinese national territory, it holds massive nationalistic and political significance. Since the feature is completely submerged about 22 meters underwater, China cannot build an artificial military island on it; instead, they send annual delegations on these white hulls to conduct "sovereignty ceremonies" above the reef. In past rituals, Chinese naval personnel and officials have literally dropped sovereignty steles (stone markers) into the water and stood on the decks to swear collective oaths of allegiance to defend the motherland's outer limits. By sending the Sansha city fleet down every single year, Beijing is attempting to satisfy the international legal criteria of "continuous and effective administration." They are intentionally creating an annual paper trail that falsely claims a local Chinese city has been successfully governing a piece of the seabed just 80 kilometers from Bintulu. This annual municipal voyage is just the crowning piece of a massive, multi-tiered machinery that builds upon the homework done by older research ships like the Nan Feng and Zhong Shan Da Xue, which originally gathered resource intelligence in the Malaysian Maritime Zone (MMZ). Today, that legacy is carried forward by modern high-tech spies like the XIANG YANG HONG 33, YUE ZHAN YU ZHI 20026, and 20027, which were caught on satellite imagery on June 6 tightly bunched together at Terumbu Laya (Dallas Reef), updating underwater maps under the protective shield of armed white hulls like CCG 5302, 5403, 5309, and 5901. By dropping the Sansha municipal fleet directly alongside this ongoing scientific and military grid, Beijing is essentially using the annual trip to lock down East Malaysia’s richest economic zones, posing a direct threat to Sarawak’s multi-billion dollar offshore oil and gas fields. Yet, while neighbors like the Philippines push back through "assertive transparency" by openly exposing these incursions, Putrajaya has stuck to its strict playbook of "quiet diplomacy," preferring behind-the-scenes talks to avoid public friction. This heavy silence risks being misread by Beijing as "tacit acquiescence," giving them a path of least resistance to slowly turn a fictional map into a permanent reality. Furthermore, because national security is tightly controlled by the federal government, this quiet approach leaves the local Sarawak state leadership dangerously in the dark about a creeping grey-zone threat operating just a stone's throw away from its vital economic lifelines and maritime sovereignty.

Just another year. The PRC conducts an annual event in which high-ranking CCP delegates travel to the southernmost part of their claim. The participant transport was the luxurious passenger ship SAN SHA 2 HUO, escorted by SAN SHA ZHI FA 301, which had just departed Mischief Reef.

Late observation: 28 MAY 2026 @CopernicusEU #Sentinel2 🛰️📷 19.1656, 123.7150 in the Philippine Sea, ~170km offshore form Philippines Likely the 🇨🇳PLA Navy Aircraft Carrier #Liaoning #CV16 @d_viekass @MT_Anderson @tom_bike @songs349 @PLATracker @detresfa_ @AaronMatthew_L @SeaLightFound @GordianKnotRay @CollinSLKoh @songs349 @TaiwanMonitor

The Independence-variant of the @USNavy littoral combat ship #USSCanberra (LCS 30) called at #ColomboPort for a brief replenishment stop. Canberra is the fourth USN LCS to call at Colombo thus far. #SriLanka #Navaldiplomacy #IOR