OFAC Has Sanctioned 1,452 Vessels — Russia and Iran Are Now at Near-Parity in Maritime Sanctions Despite Russia's Program Being 4 Years Old vs Iran's 40+

USE CASE. Three groups need a per-program breakdown of sanctioned vessels: (1) maritime compliance officers at international shipping companies, oil supermajors, and tanker brokers running OFAC vessel screening before each port call; (2) shadow fleet trackers at NGOs (Crystol Energy, Atlantic Council DFRLab, Center for Advanced Defense Studies) and at the EU Council and UK OFSI; (3) US Coast Guard and Treasury enforcement coordinators tracking the operational tempo of vessel designations. RESULT. The OFAC SDN list contains 1,452 distinct sanctioned vessels as of 2026-04-13. Top 10 sanctions programs by sanctioned vessel count: RUSSIA-EO14024 448 vessels (31% of all SDN vessels), IRAN-EO13902 241, IRAN 188, UKRAINE-EO13662 183, GLOMAG 157, IFSR 128, SDGT 126, NPWMD 122, IRAN-EO13846 116, DPRK4 65 (North Korea), VENEZUELA-EO13850 56, DPRK 29, PEESA-EO14039 17 (Protecting Europe's Energy Security Act), DPRK3 11, LIBYA3 8. STRUCTURAL READING. Combined Russia + Ukraine vessel programs (RUSSIA-EO14024 + UKRAINE-EO13662 + UKRAINE-EO13661 + PEESA-EO14039): approximately 631 vessels = 43% of all SDN vessels. Combined Iran-related vessel programs (IRAN-EO13902 + IRAN + IFSR + IRAN-EO13846 + IRAN-related EOs): approximately 673 vessels = 46%. Combined DPRK / North Korea (DPRK + DPRK3 + DPRK4): 105 vessels = 7%. The Russia and Iran vessel programs are at near-parity (43% vs 46%) despite a dramatic difference in program age. Iran has been sanctioned by the US continuously since the 1979 hostage crisis and the IRAN program has been adding vessels for over 40 years to reach its current 673; the Russia EO 14024 program reached its 448 vessel count in just 4 years (2022-2026), an average of 112 new vessel designations per year. The Russia maritime sanctions buildout is the fastest sustained vessel-designation tempo in OFAC history. The 'shadow fleet' phenomenon — old tankers operated by opaque ownership structures to circumvent G7 oil price caps — is the primary driver of the EO 14024 vessel additions: most of the 448 vessels are crude oil tankers and product tankers operating in the Russian export route from Black Sea, Baltic, and Pacific ports through chokepoints like the Turkish Straits, the Skagerrak, and the Korean Peninsula. CAVEATS. (1) The 1,452 vessel count is the SDN list as of 2026-04-13; OFAC adds vessels almost weekly. (2) The Iran-related count (~673) includes some overlap between programs (a vessel can be on IRAN + IFSR + IRAN-EO13902 simultaneously); my count is per (vessel, program) so total program-share rounds to slightly above 100%. (3) The 'vessel' type in the OFAC CSV is what OFAC classifies, including tankers, dry bulk carriers, container ships, fishing vessels, yachts, and naval auxiliaries; type-of-vessel breakdown would require parsing the additional address/specification files that OFAC publishes separately. (4) Aircraft (342 entries on the SDN list) are a separate category and not counted here.

OFAC, the US Treasury sanctions office, blocks specific vessels (ships) from US ports and from doing business with US-related entities. The blocked vessels are listed on the public OFAC SDN list. I downloaded the current list and counted the sanctioned vessels by sanctions program. There are 1,452 vessels currently on the SDN list. The top program is RUSSIA-EO14024 with 448 vessels — that's the same Executive Order from 2022 that I covered in iter 98 for the broader SDN list. Iran-related programs combined have about 673 vessels. The combined Russia and Ukraine programs have about 631. So Russia and Iran are roughly at parity for the share of US-sanctioned vessels, with each accounting for about 43-46% of the 1,452. What's striking is the timeline. Iran has been sanctioned by the US continuously since 1979, and the various Iran sanctions programs have been adding vessels for over 40 years to reach the current 673. The Russia EO 14024 program reached its 448 vessel count in just 4 years, since the spring of 2022. That's an average of 112 new Russia vessel designations per year — the fastest sustained vessel-designation tempo in OFAC history. The Russia maritime designations are concentrated on what's called the 'shadow fleet' — older crude oil and product tankers operated through opaque ownership structures (often shell companies in UAE, Hong Kong, Cyprus, Turkey, or India) that move Russian oil after the G7 imposed a price cap in late 2022. By contrast, the Iran vessel sanctions list is dominated by Iranian state-owned tankers from the National Iranian Tanker Company and entities tied to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Why this matters: maritime compliance officers at international shipping companies and oil supermajors run sanctions screening on every port call; the volume of OFAC vessel designations doubled from 2022 to 2026 because of Russia, and the per-day operational compliance burden has shifted dramatically. Shadow fleet trackers at NGOs and at the EU Council monitor the OFAC vessel additions to identify which Russian export route is currently receiving the most enforcement attention. The fact that Russia reached parity with Iran in just 4 years is the single most important data point about the operational tempo of Russia maritime sanctions — and it's not a number that's routinely cited in trade press, which usually quotes specific vessel-batch announcements rather than the cumulative share.

RUSSIA-EO14024 448 (31% of all SDN vessels) · IRAN-EO13902 241 · IRAN 188 · UKRAINE-EO13662 183 · GLOMAG 157 · IFSR 128 · SDGT 126 · NPWMD 122 · IRAN-EO13846 116 · DPRK4 65

Combined Russia-Ukraine vessels (RUSSIA-EO14024 + UKRAINE-EO13662 + UKRAINE-EO13661 + PEESA-EO14039): approximately 631 = 43% of 1,452 SDN vessels · Combined Iran-related vessels: approximately 673 = 46% · Combined DPRK / North Korea vessels: 105 = 7% · Russia program age: 4 years (signed April 2021, expanded after Feb 2022 Ukraine invasion) · Iran program age: 40+ years (continuous US sanctions since 1979) · Russia operational tempo: ~112 new vessel designations per year, the fastest sustained vessel-designation tempo in OFAC history

1,452 distinct sanctioned vessels · 1,810 vessel-program assignments (some vessels on multiple programs) · top 4 programs (RUSSIA-EO14024 + IRAN-EO13902 + IRAN + UKRAINE-EO13662) account for 1,060 vessels = 73% of the entire SDN vessel list · Russia and Iran are at near-parity in shipping sanctions volume (43% vs 46%) despite the Russia program being one-tenth the age of the Iran program