The first shipment of Russian crude oil has arrived in the Philippines in five years, following talks between the Philippine government, private sector intermediaries, and Russian suppliers. Several reports, citing data from shipping analytics firms LSEG, Kepler, and OilX, stated that a tanker carrying 100,000 tons of Espo blend oil from Russia's Kozmino port was headed to the Petron refinery in Bataan. According to the Philippine newspaper The Star, the Marine Traffic website, which specializes in tracking cargo, tracked the arrival of the Sierra Leone-flagged vessel 'Sara Sky', laden with oil, at the Limay port in Bataan. An informed source told France Press on Thursday that a vessel carrying more than 700,000 barrels of Russian crude oil arrived in the Philippines, days after Manila declared a national energy emergency due to the ongoing war in the Middle East.
