US embassy cables | Malta 'opposed tighter controls' on Iranian movements – UK

The July 2008 cable, released in the Wikileaks website, says Malta and Cyprus had expressed “opposition” to tighter controls on Iran Air Cargo movements and the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (Irisl), which had made the Malta Freeport its Mediterranean hub in 2003.

The detail emerged in a conversation over international sanctions against Iran, by Isabella McRae, deputy head of the UK Foreign Office's non-proliferation department.

According to the cable, the UK agreed with the French proposal to require mandatory declarations by port authorities whenever an Iran Air plane or IRISL ship arrived or departed. But McRae said that opposition to tighter controls came from the "island Members" of the EU - Cyprus and Malta.

But a year later, the Maltese finance ministry would be obliging in assisting the US government with all the information it could provide on Irisl and its network of shell companies in Malta.

In April 2009, US Treasury under-secretary Stuart Levey met with Alan Caruana, head of secretariat in the finance ministry to discuss Irisl’s operations in Malta.

The Maltese government has formally adopted EU sanctions against various branches and subsidiaries of Irisl, which has used a network of front companies in Malta to evade restrictions on its trade.

There are at least 42 Irisl-owned companies which own ships formerly belonging to Irisl. Instead they use the services of the Maltese-owned Royal-Med Shipping Agency, in Sliema, which is the agent for the private Iranian company  Hafiz Darya Shipping Lines (HDS). Almost half of Irisl’s fleet was renamed and registered under the Maltese flag.

“During these meetings, Caruana was receptive to the US message and shared a document containing shipping statistics for Irisl in 2008,” the cable from the Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says.