When the supertanker Young Yong sailed to the Chinese port of Qingdao in September last year, it had quality certificates for its cargo stating it was transporting Malaysian crude oil, according to the documents reviewed by Reuters.
But satellite images and photos show the Chinese-owned ship had loaded the oil four months earlier in Venezuela, an OPEC nation in South America under U.S. oil sanctions.
The Young Yong is one of three vessels identified by Reuters that were chartered by little-known companies to export Venezuelan oil and used false documents to conceal its origin, according to shipping documents and 11 sources with knowledge of the trade.
Two of those tankers, including the Young Yong, were designated this month by U.S. authorities for violating sanctions on Iran, one of Venezuela's closest allies.
