UN to clamp down on illicit shipping practices
The body's shipping agency is formulating measures to prevent rogue companies hiding their country of origin
London/Moscow — The UN’s shipping agency is working on tougher measures to clamp down on rogue shipping companies trying to use flag registries fraudulently to conceal their activities, officials said. All commercial ships have to be registered — flagged in a particular country — partly to comply with safety and environmental laws. With international and US sanctions imposed on countries including North Korea, Iran and Syria, some ships involved in such trade have used tactics to sidestep the measures including turning off their location transponders and falsely reporting their flag registry, also to secure insurance. Drug and weapon smuggling are among other areas of trade in which front companies attempt to conceal their activities to avoid being detected. The International Maritime Organisation (IMO) agreed on a series of measures after a committee session last week which included the creation of a comprehensive database of registries and ways to improve information on the illeg...
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