Oil Heist Uncovered at Shell's Biggest Refinery
Police say 17 arrested in connection with oil theft; 11 charged; Shell expects "short delay" in operations due to case. Eleven men were charged in a Singapore court on Tuesday in connection with a large-scale oil theft at Shell's biggest refinery, while police said they were investigating six other men arrested in a weekend raid. Police in the island-state said on Tuesday they had detained 17 men, whose ages ranged from 30 to 63, and seized millions of dollars in cash and a small tanker during their investigations into theft at the Pulau Bukom industrial site, which sits just south of Singapore's main island. Oil refining and shipping have contributed significantly to Singapore's rising wealth during the past decades.
Dutch Police Investigate Illegal Bunker Fuel Blending
"During three days, we checked whether 30 vessels had the correct documentation. In 12 cases, documents were forged, or the environmental law was violated," Hans Tuinder, head of the Criminal Investigation department for the Marine Police, told Xinhua. Over 22,000 vessels are bunkered in the Netherlands annually, taking in around 13 million tonnes of fuel in total. The port of Rotterdam is a major trading location, the source of around 88 percent of all bunker fuel. A study conducted by the scientific institute CE Delft last year showed some ocean-going vessels were bunkered by fuel oil contaminated with hazardous waste materials. Fuel oil "naturally" contains a variety of hazardous substances in high concentrations.
