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"...financial transactions relating to cargo onboard vessels should not become subject to the OFAC blocking requirement by virtue of any incidental movement of that vessel near or to port or shipment infrastructure owned by a Specially Designated National (SDN). Examples of these types of SDNs might be port terminals owned or operated by SDNs, such as port terminals operated by Tidewater, targeted government instrumentalities, or for Crimea, passage through the Strait of Kerch [Ukraine 13685]. Based on the Working Group’s conversations with shipping industry experts, cargo onboard vessels passing through these ports and their infrastructure does not incur duties, or charges for passage through the relevant territorial waters, port calls or simple transshipments. Hence, it stands to reason that duties and charges only apply to cargo when goods make Customs Entry, even if only temporarily. In other words, cargo must be...
Notes:
1) BAFT/The Clearing House Sanctions Working Group reports two notable instances of guidance from OFAC. OFAC was apparently willing to allow a person subject to U.S. jurisdiction to facilitate a transaction involving non-Iranian goods being transshipped through an SDN Iranian port, as well as a Syrian port blocked by virtue of its ownership by the blocked Government of Syria.
In doing so, OFAC would have distinguished the situation discussed in a July, 2015 letter to OFAC from the Clearing House Association L.L.C., and the Bankers Association of Finance and Trade re: Blocked Burmese Port, in which OFAC provided guidance to the effect that a letter of credit involving goods departing from a blocked port must also be blocked (as it is property in which the blocked port operator has an "interest").
If the guidance reported here is...