Unregulated tankers sidestepping Western sanctions are positioning a larger danger to the Mediterranean region and Greece is undertaking more protective procedures to protect its coast, the country's shipping minister informed Reuters on Tuesday.

As much as 850 oil tankers are approximated to form the so-called shadow fleet carrying oil from countries such as Iran and Venezuela in addition to Russia, which has multiple constraints on its oil exports.

The ships carrying these oil cargoes position a huge ecological challenge, market and expert sources say, considering that they are hard to track due to the fact that of their nontransparent ownership and use of non-Western insurance and other marine services, and they have little incentive to follow cleaner shipping standards.

I can see some dangers about the environment, in specific in areas like the Mediterranean Sea and very near to our mainland and islands, Greece's Christos Stylianides stated on the sidelines of the Posidonia shipping week in Athens.

It positioned a huge issue for the fairness of the worldwide oil trade, he said.

Shadow tankers have actually been associated with a minimum of 50 incidents to date, including fires, engine failures, collisions, loss of steerage, and oil spills, German insurance company Allianz Commercial stated in a report last month.

For us, no doubt that we protest this type of trade, Stylianides stated.

We can not accept this situation so near our coast.

Last month the Greek navy extended an advisory successfully prohibiting ship traffic off the coast of the southeastern Peloponnese that two sources stated was focused on discouraging ship-to-ship transfers of Russian oil off Greece.

( A) ship-to-ship transfer is not forbidden. Sometimes it is required, it becomes part of the trade, Stylianides stated.

But given this advancement of the grey fleet, our concerns remain about a possible mishap with significant ecological effect.