Saudi Arabia has rejected claims that it purchased 25 oil tankers and has denied that any such acquisitions were behind rising costs to ship Iraqi crude, the Saudi Ministry of Energy said in a clarification reported on 23 September 2026.
The ministry’s statement was issued in direct response to public remarks from Iraqi officials, according to the report, and categorically dismissed suggestions that Riyadh’s actions had played a role in increasing freight charges for Iraqi exports.
reports recorded that the clarification followed comments by Iraqi Oil Minister Bassem Mohammed Khudair Al-Abadi and by Ali Nizar Al-Shatari. The Saudi statement, as summarised in the report, sought to separate the alleged tanker purchases from the question of transport costs for Iraqi oil.
Saudi ministry clarification
In the report, the Ministry of Energy explicitly denied that Saudi Arabia had bought 25 oil tankers and rejected any causal link between such an acquisition and higher shipping costs borne by Iraq. The ministry framed the denial as a rebuttal to concerns raised publicly by Iraqi officials.
The clarification does not, in the account provided by the source, supply further operational detail about Saudi tanker ownership or about commercial chartering arrangements. The ministry’s response, as presented in the report, was limited to denying the specific purchase claim and disputing the asserted connection to Iraqi freight rates.
Regional shipping implications
Although the ministry’s statement is brief in the version conveyed by the report, it touches on issues of interest to shipowners, charterers and oil exporters because claims about state purchases of tonnage can influence market sentiment. The report notes only that Riyadh rejected the allegation and that it denied responsibility for any resultant changes to Iraqi shipping costs.
The reports item is dated 23 September 2026 and identifies the exchange of public comments between the two governments as the immediate context for the ministry’s clarification. Beyond that exchange, the report does not offer additional corroborating documentation, contract notices or registration details that would substantiate either the original purchase claim or the denial.
The sequence reported, an Iraqi official raising concerns and a Saudi ministry issuing a denial, underlines how statements by ministers and senior officials can quickly become material for maritime market reporting. The note in the source confines itself to the denial and the asserted absence of a link to Iraq’s transport costs, rather than advancing independent evidence about tanker transfers or freight-rate movements.
Taken at face value, the ministry’s clarification removes an immediate diplomatic assertion that Riyadh had acquired a fleet of 25 tankers and that this action was elevating the cost of moving Iraq’s oil. The report does not record any follow-up measures, such as regulatory filings, vessel registry changes or commercial notices, that would verify or refute the broader commercial implications discussed publicly by the officials involved.
The item published by reports on 23 September 2026 therefore stands as the primary public account supplied here: it documents a denial from the Saudi Ministry of Energy and states that the denial was prompted by remarks from named Iraqi officials. The report, as summarised, stops short of offering documentary proof for either the original allegation or the ministry’s rebuttal.
Any further assessment of whether state actions have influenced shipping costs for Iraqi crude would require additional, verifiable evidence such as vessel transaction records, chartering announcements, or freight-market data not contained in the sourced report. For the moment, the official position reported is a clear denial by Riyadh that it bought 25 tankers or that it was responsible for higher Iraqi shipping costs.