The US government has imposed sanctions on two companies and four vessels for allegedly transporting commodities to the benefit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps and the Houthis in Yemen.
United Arab Emirates-based Global Tech Marine Services is accused of managing and operating an aframax, as well as one MR and one LR product tanker involved in supporting Sa’id al-Jamal — a commercial organisation that the US says generates revenue for the Revolutionary Guards and the Yemeni rebel group that is attacking shipping in the Red Sea.
The first ship said to be involved with Global Tech Marine is the 47,100-dwt MR product carrier Sincere 02 (ex-Biendong Victory, built 2001).
According to the S&P Global database, the Sincere 02 passed under Global Tech Marine’s management in January 2022 and it has been flying the flag of Panama since July 2023.
The US treasury department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (Ofac) accuses the management of the Sincere 02 of forging documents to disguise the origin of the goods it was carrying in cooperation with already sanctioned Turkish individual Abdi Nasir Ali Mahamud.
The second ship is an aframax, the 105,700-dwt Fortune Galaxy (ex-Eurobrave, built 2003), which Global Tech Marine or its clients appear to have purchased in May 2022 and which has been flying the flag of Panama since.
The third is the Cameroon-flagged, 70,600-dwt LR tanker Molecule (ex-Salvador, built 1999), which is listed in the fleet of the UAE company since July 2021.
Alongside Global Tech Marine, the US is targeting Hong Kong-based Cielo Maritime Ltd over its alleged ownership and management of the 150,900-dwt suezmax Mehle (built 1998).
Formerly trading as White Trader and then as FC Star, the Panama-flagged Mehle has been with Cielo since last May.
This is the second time in two weeks that Ofac has targeted Houthi money networks. On 28 December, it blacklisted a financier and three money exchange houses it said were behind the movement of millions of dollars from Iran via Turkey to Yemen.
The US has also sought to counter the Houthi attacks through a new maritime force it is leading under Operation Prosperity Guardian, as well as by launching airstrikes against the rebels.
Liberia last month deflagged seven other tankers blacklisted by the US.
