Watching Libya August 18, 2011

The General National Maritime Transport Company (GNMTC) is – in its own words – “a Libyan State owned company  founded in 1975” with a capital of 1.2 billion Libyan Dinars (see the GNMTC’s website).  The company is based in Tripoli and is understood to have subsidiaries in Malta and Hong Kong. GNMTC is involved in at least 14 companies registered in Malta.

Its present fleet includes Crude Oil, Product and Chemical, and LPG carriers. GNMTC’s fleet of Suezmax vessels – that is, whose maximum measurements enable them to transit through the Suez Canal – consists of four tankers built between 2007 and 2009 for a total of 639,874 dwt. It owns 11 Aframax vessels – largest in the Average Freight Rate Assessment tanker rate system, between 75,000 and 115,000 dwt –  for a total of  1,226,654 tons, all of which were built between 2002 and 2008. GNMTC also owns 2 medium range ships of 46, 925 dwt each both built in 2009 and 4 ‘Handysize’ vessels built between 2004 and 2006. Three other ships (two LPG carriers and a smaller vessel) are older, and were built between 1992 and 1997.

On June 21, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), in a bid to tighten US sanctions against the regime, added GNMTC to the list of companies subject to sanctions pursuant to Executive Order 13566 for being owned or controlled by the Government of Libya. Read the official US Treasury statement.  [For more background see also Watching Libya July 16/17, 2011 below.]

On the other hand, GNMTC is not included in the European Union and United Nations list of individuals and entities targeted for sanctions. Several sources indicate that GNMTC is effectively controlled by a person who is subject to travel bans and asset freezes by all three lists (UN, US and EU), namely Hannibal Gheddafi. As the freeze on assets also applies to assets owned, held or controlled by individual and entities explicitly targeted by the sanctions, then – assuming the link between the asset and the said individual or entity is effectively real – GNMTC should be covered by the freeze. This, it would seem to follow, would also apply to companies owned, held or controlled by GNMTC in jurisdictions that have undertaken to apply sanctions.

Governments that have announced their intention to extend credit lines to the Transitional National Council (TNC) will almost certainly wish to use frozen assets in their jurisdiction as security. Identifying the relevant assets is therefore a critical issue. [Read more about Malta’s announcement that it is considering extending credit to the TNC in Watching Libya August 11, 2011 below.]