The US has warned the shipping community not to have dealings with the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (IRISL) and National Iranian Tanker Company (NITC) after re-imposing sanctions on Iran’s energy, shipping and banking sectors, among others, on Monday.
In a statement, the Department of The Treasury said it added 65 subsidiaries and associated individuals as well as 122 ships of IRISL, including Valfajr Shipping, Hafez Darya Arya Shipping and Safiran Payam Darya Shipping, to the sanction list.
In addition, the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control identified another 37 NITC-affiliated entities and vessels on the list while updating the information on the existing 52 ships.
“The Iranian shipping industry is reviving previously employed deceptive practices in an effort to obfuscate IRISL or NITC’s interests in vessels and other property,” the Treasury said.
“Among the IRISL vessels identified today are four vessels that recently underwent name and partial ownership changes but that are still property in which IRISL has a blockable interest.”
“The global maritime industry should be on alert for Iran’s use of such tactics and make every effort to thwart Iran’s use of their jurisdictions to create front companies; to revoke their flags from IRISL and NITC vessels; and to deny other means that enable Iran to conceal its interest in the vessels.”
“The knowing provision of significant financial, material, technological, or other support to, or goods or services in support of, these entities could be sanctionable.”
The sanction list has a record high of over 900 Iran-related entities.
Separately, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has formally named the eight countries that received waivers for the sanctions on Iranian crude imports.
“We have decided to issue temporary allotments to a handful of countries…to ensure a well supplied oil market,” Pompeo said.
China, India, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Greece and Turkey will be allowed to continued purchases of Iranian crude for the next 180 days. However, government officials have said no further exemptions will be granted and two of the countries have already ended their purchases.
“We will continue the negotiations to get all the nations to zero,” Pompeo said.
According to Pompeo, over 20 countries have reduced oil imports from Iran, with the aggregate cuts amounting to more than one million barrels per day.
In the previous round of sanctions, approximately 20 countries received waivers from the Obama administration and were able to continue renew them during 2013-2015.
