On Saturday, July 25th 2026, the Iranian oil tanker Humanity passed through the Straits of Malacca and Singapore before heading northeast toward Malaysia’s coast, where it turned off its automatic identification system (AIS). Satellite data confirmed the 330-metre tanker arrived at Malaysia’s Eastern Outer Port Limits (EOPL), a 1,200-square-kilometre area about 70km off the shore in the South China Sea.

This anchorage off Malaysia’s EOPL continues to serve as a busy marketplace for Iranian oil, despite international blockades. Maritime security expert Charlie Brown, director of Southeast Asia Regional Programs at the Yokosuka Council on Asia-Pacific Studies (YCAPS), said the area is “just as busy as it has ever been.”

The oil cargoes are believed to be destined for China, which historically purchases about 90 percent of Iran’s crude oil exports, according to the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission. These shipments are facilitated by networks of middlemen supplying China’s independent “teapot” refineries, as noted by Erica Downs, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy.

Although Chinese refineries’ purchase of Iranian crude has dropped by approximately 40 percent since the war began, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that networks like the EOPL have maintained the flow of the remaining oil sales.

This development highlights ongoing complexities in global oil trade amid geopolitical tensions and sanctions.

Sources