US sanctions Indian couple for selling fake flags to Iran's oil fleet, web of registries claimed to represent Guyana Eswatini and Laos

The U.S. Treasury on Wednesday sanctioned an India-based couple and their web of companies for supplying fake flags and false certificates to ships carrying Iranian oil. The designations, made under Executive Order 13902 as part of what Treasury calls Operation Economic Outcast, name Suniel Kumar Sharma and his wife Jaspreet Preeti Shahid, who Treasury says have worked out of Chandigarh for years.

According to the department, the couple tricked maritime regulators in several countries into accepting false flag authorities and fake classification societies — the bodies that decide which nation a ship sails under and whether it meets safety standards. Their network bought web addresses and built websites claiming to represent Guyana, Eswatini, Laos, Aruba, Mali, Mozambique and Sint Maarten, among others; most of the registries were tied to no real company in the countries named. The activity began as early as 2014, Treasury says, when the couple tried to pose as the flagging authority of Dominica. Services on offer included flagging ships, training and certifying sailors, and classifying vessels.

The customers were sanctioned tankers, which kept turning to the registries even though, by Treasury's account, it was widely known the governments did not back them. Through registries built for Aruba, Nicaragua and Sint Maarten, Sharma supplied false flags to the sanctioned tankers LATTAFA, BINARY STAR and VERA. In April the U.S. Department of War seized the MAJESTIC X, a vessel carrying Iranian oil under a false Guyana flag.

The operation adapted as attention grew. In 2023 Sharma set up a Singapore company, Eswatini Maritime Affairs and International Ship Registry; Eswatini's authorities have publicly distanced themselves from it. When Sharma's activities drew scrutiny, Shahid took over the group on paper, and after press coverage several fake registries were shut down, among them the Laos Ship Registry, formerly the International Maritime Safety Agency of Guyana. The couple's businesses, Treasury notes, range from financial services to media streaming platforms. Two other Indian nationals, Ashwani Kumar Dhiman and Ishwinder Singh, are named as directors of Sharma-linked firms, and a company based in Türkiye was sanctioned the same day for serving Iran's aviation industry.

Announcing the action on X, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said countries and companies are "either with us or against us," and that the United States knows where they are and will sanction anyone backing the Iranian government by land, sea or air. The designations land the same week Tehran exempted Indian shipping from its Hormuz transit restrictions while threatening a South Korean tanker fleet wholesale.

Eswatini's government says it has nothing to do with the registry carrying its name; that registry, Treasury notes, still offers flagging services to ships carrying Iranian oil.