New York indicts Iranian shipping company

New York indicts Iranian shipping company    Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr. announced a 317-count indictment of 11 corporations and five individuals for their roles in a conspiracy involving one of the world's largest shipping companies, the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (IRISL), its regional offices, and its agents.
   The indictment was coordinated with an announcement by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control that it was taking actions to sanction 10 companies and three individuals as part of an effort to target the financial underpinnings of IRISL.
   The district attorney said the defendants “evaded U.S. economic sanctions tied to bans on trade with countries that harbor foreign terrorists and proliferators of weapons of mass destruction. In doing so the defendants repeatedly falsified the records of banks located in New York County to access illegally the U.S. financial system. The defendants deceived Manhattan banks into processing more than $60 million worth of payments using aliases or corporate alter egos to hide their conduct.”
   'Today our office is shining a spotlight on the fraudulent activities of IRISL, which has been sanctioned by the United States, the European Union, and the United Nations for its role in the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction,' Vance said. 'IRISL and its sanctioned affiliates used a web of aliases or corporate alter egos across the globe to exploit the services of financial institutions located in Manhattan.”
   A New York grand jury handed down an indictment that said after OFAC designated IRISL and several affiliates as proliferators of weapons of mass destruction, the companies began “using alias names and shell companies to gain access to the United States financial system to continue conducting their financial operations.”