Ahmadinejad. Deceits at sea
Photo: AP
NYT: Iran circumventing sanctions at sea
World-class newspaper reveals that most freight ships from Iran's state-owned shipping company switch flags, names, and ownership on regular basis in order to transport contraband goods from around world. Treasury under-secretary: They are as smart as us
WASHINGTON – Iran is undertaking a number of maneuvers, such as switching flags, names, and ownership of its freight ships, in order to evade US export controls at sea. A New York Times investigation published Tuesday revealed that blacklisting Iranian ships under US sanctions efforts has not prevented the ayatollahs from sailing around the world to import contraband goods.
Iran's efforts to circumvent sanctions have increased in recent months, especially as a fourth round of sanctions is slated to be voted on in the UN Security Council on Wednesday. In addition to international sanctions against the regime, the US has instituted its own sanctions forbidding companies doing business in the US to have contact with Iranian companies from various industries, including shipping.
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The shell companies are located far from Iran, in places like Malta, Cyprus, Hong Kong, Germany, and even the Isles of Man. However, the NYT report revealed that the American intelligence has uncovered the connection between most of the ships save 10 and Irisl.
The company IHS Fairplay, a British-based company that issues merchant vessels their unique identification numbers and tracks them throughout their lifetimes and whose data analysis revealed the gap in Irisl's ship registrations, discovered that the 10 unaccounted for ships are currently operated by newly established companies located in Irisl facilities in Tehran, and not at the addresses provided to IHS Fairplay.
Hong Kong ship that found its way to Iran
The report presents one case as a study of how Iran is using shell companies to scuttle sanctions. On January 24, 2009, a freighter flying a Hong Kong flag anchored in Durban, South Africa. The ship stayed in the port for just one hour during which it picked up one piece of cargo – a Bladerunner 51 speedboat that can be armed with torpedoes and used as an attack in the Persian Gulf.
When the ship left port, the name painted on the side of the ship was Diplomat and its papers listed it as the property of a company called Starry Shine Ltd. However, six months earlier, the ship was called Mufateh and was owned by the state-owned Irisl.
Americans tracking the ship discovered that the ship continually changed names and ownership. The US government issued word of the change, but by that time the Diplomat had again changed its name to Amplify. It was last seen two months ago in the Pakistani port city of Karachi under mysterious new ownership and management.
The entanglement of ownership companies, directors, and subsidiaries ultimately led investigators to the Isle of Man, which is a paradise for criminals and terrorists with laundering as one of their objectives.
This single case of swapping names and registrations shows that Iran's big deceits at sea spread throughout Europe and Asia. Under secretary of the US Treasury Department Stuart Levey, who oversees US sanctions efforts, even gave the Iranians a high mark for their cat-and-mouse game.
"We are dealing with people who are as smart as we are, and of course they can read our list,” Levey said.
