Georgia, Sanctions Backdoor, and the Machinery of Russia’s Shadow Fleet (opens in new tab)

A quiet logistics story has turned into a strategic one, and it sits uncomfortably in the Caucasus. Open-source investigations now show that Georgia has emerged as a critical transit node in Russia’s effort to keep its oil exports flowing despite Western sanctions, not through dramatic weapons shipments or state-level agreements, but through something far more mundane and therefore harder to stop: spare parts for marine engines. This is the kind of story that usually hides in customs database...