Greek Shipper Pleads Guilty to Smuggling Iranian Crude Oil, will Pay $2.4m Fine

…Mark Wallace, a former US ambassador to the United Nations under President George W. Bush who heads United Against Nuclear Iran, praised Empire Navigation for agreeing to the plea. He described Iran's oil smuggling as a “mob-like” operation and urged others to abandon the trade. “They faced down Iranian assassination threats in Greece,” Wallace told the AP. “They took the off ramp to leave the mob.” Wallace declined to elaborate, and the US court documents offered no detail on the alleged assassination threat — though prosecutors did cite “security risks to the defendants, the government, as well as the vessel and its crew members” in their application to seal the case from public view in March.