[notatoad]

>There is always some poor or corrupt country willing to ignore consequences as long as they can make a buck.

this is basically what i'm suggesting as the solution here, rather than the problem.

if you're in command of a tanker carrying $50m worth of oil, and the company that technically owns it owes you and your crew $175k and doesn't want to pay, surely you're never too far from a country who would be happy to take that boat off your hands and cover the lost wages. how are these boats just waiting around in the ocean for a solution, when there's so much wealth on board?

[jgeada]

I think their problem is that very few countries have refinery capacity to deal with crude oil, which is what these ships contain. So the crew have limited choices. It is a "someone else's problem", to quote the Hitchhiker's Guide.

[nradov]

It's not that simple. The stranded vessels are often not really seaworthy and can't be safely sailed to another port. They might be low on fuel with no cash to buy more (the cargo won't necessarily work as fuel). The vessel may be docked in a port already and owe fees to the local authorities who won't allow it to leave.

[hattmall]

I don't think it's as easy to offload oil as you're assuming. Most of the sketchy countries don't have refineries or storage capacity and they risk some fallout from the sanctions if they do anything with the oil. Like maybe if you could get the boat to North Korea they might pay you $0.01 on the dollar or something.