On Thursday, the Department of Justice announced it had discovered a scheme involving multiple parties affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a designated foreign terrorist organization, in which Iranian oil was covertly shipped to Venezuela, enabling the IRGC to reap profits from petroleum sales that “support the IRGC’s full range of nefarious activities, including the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery, support for terrorism, and a variety of human rights abuses, at home and abroad.”
The DOJ named “all petroleum-product cargo aboard the Bella with international maritime organization (IMO) number 9208124, the Bering with IMO number 9149225, the Pandi with IMO number 9105073, and the Luna with IMO number 9208100,” saying it was subject to forfeiture based on the terrorism forfeiture statute.
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