Eagle has landed an OFAC penalty
The US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (‘OFAC’) has settled with a Marshall Islands’ shipping company, Eagle Shipping International, headquartered in Connecticut, for $1.25m, for alleged violations of the Burma Sanctions Regulations.
In enforcement information, published 27 January, OFAC says the apparent violations had arisen out of the company entering into a charter agreement in 2011 with a Singaporean buyer of sand to carry sea sand from Burma to Singapore, despite sample documents raising concerns on account of the shipper being listed as a company called Myawaddy Trading Ltd, at that time an entity on the OFAC specially designated national list.
The settlement details describe protracted negotiations between parties involved in the transaction resulting in Eagle ‘applying for an OFAC license authorizing the Eagle Vessel to carry the sand cargo to Singapore due to the evidence suggesting an SDN’s involvement in the shipping transaction … However, before OFAC responded to the license request, on or about July 2, 2011, Eagle, citing crew safety concerns, signed the revised shipping documents and obtained the return of the crew’s passports. The Eagle Vessel then left Burma and subsequently discharged the cargo in Singapore.
‘After this first sand voyage, on May 18, 2012, Eagle filed a new application with OFAC requesting a license that would authorize Eagle vessels to carry more sand cargoes procured, partially or wholly, directly or indirectly, from Myawaddy. On October 11, 2012, OFAC denied the application.
‘While the application was pending with OFAC, and despite the absence of OFAC’s authorization, Eagle resumed shipping sand procured from Myawaddy. The former President of Eagle Shipping later received OFAC’s denial letter, but allegedly failed to forward it to others within Eagle. Eagle thereafter continued carrying sand cargoes supplied by Myawaddy from Burma to Singapore.’
Full details at: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/CivPen/Documents/20200127_eagle.pdf
