The ‘Ghost Fleets’ Moving Oil Around the World episode artwork

EPISODE · Jan 27, 2026 · 28 MIN

The ‘Ghost Fleets’ Moving Oil Around the World

from Deborah Lebree's podcast · host Deborah Lebree

Since December, the U.S. has been stopping and seizing oil tankers traveling in and out of Venezuela. They are part of what is known as a ghost fleet — tankers that try to secretly move oil around the world, funding states such as Venezuela, Iran and Russia.Christiaan Triebert, a reporter on the Visual Investigations team, explains what these ghost fleets are and why their days might now be numbered.Guest: Christiaan Triebert, a reporter for The New York Times working on the Visual Investigations team.Background reading: U.S. forces seized its sixth oil tanker linked to Venezuela.What are “ghost fleet” ships?Photo: Andy Buchanan/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFor more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.  Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

Episode metadata supplied by the publisher feed · Published Jan 27, 2026

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