Marine war risk insurance is no longer a niche line item for oil traders. David Osler of Lloyd\u2019s List told industry colleagues that additional premiums on high-risk voyages are adding roughly $7 to $8 to each barrel of crude, after claims from the wider Iran war topped about $2 billion across more than 70 cases. Additional premiums that used to sit near a fraction of a percent of a ship\u2019s value have, in extreme quotes, climbed toward 10 percent. A very large crude carrier valued around $140 million can face millions of dollars in extra cover for a single transit.<\/p>\n
The southern Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb gateway into the Gulf of Aden are part of that bill. After Houthi attacks on Saudi-linked traffic and a declared maritime embargo against Riyadh earlier in the summer, London\u2019s Joint War Committee pushed the high-risk notification line hundreds of kilometres north along the Red Sea coast. Indicative southern Red Sea war risk quotes had already jumped above 1 percent of vessel value from about 0.3 percent before the blockade announcement, with some Saudi-linked calls near Jizan, Al Shuqaiq, and the Bab el-Mandeb corridor quoted as high as 3 percent, according to Reuters reporting carried by maritime outlets.<\/p>\n
That pricing lands on landlocked Ethiopia whether or not a tanker ever docks in Djibouti with Ethiopian cargo. Ministry of Transport figures tracked by Birr Metrics show Djibouti still moved 96.7 percent of Ethiopia\u2019s seaborne trade in 2025\/26, including 4.23 million tonnes of fuel imports inside a 17.6 million tonne cargo year. Berbera took only 2.74 percent. When underwriters reprice Bab el-Mandeb and Cape diversions become the rational default, war risk insurance and emergency freight surcharges pass through the same Djibouti corridor that Abiy Ahmed\u2019s government keeps promising to diversify. The regime in Addis Ababa can announce multimodal reforms. It cannot repeal London war risk schedules.<\/p>\n
Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n Arabian Gulf Business Insight<\/a><\/p>\n