Foreign Affairs Minister Carmelo Abela will next week meet with representatives of the Russian government to discuss Malta’s proposed sanctions on a group of alleged fuel smugglers.
Government sources confirmed that Mr Abela will be having a meeting with Russian officials, but it is not yet clear whether the meeting will be held at the Russian Embassy in Malta or Rome.
Malta hopes to get Russia to lift its temporary block on its proposed UN sanctions against the former footballer turned alleged fuel smuggler Darren Debono and his associates.
Malta last month put forward UN designations for Mr Debono and his associates, fuel trader Gordon Debono and Libyan Fahmi Bin Khalifa, to the UN Security Council. Although many members of the Security Council were quick to approve the proposed designations, Russia put the matter on hold at the 11th hour.
Sources privy to details of the upcoming meeting told Times of Malta that Mr Abela would give technical details on Malta’s sanctions request. One source, however, said the Russia government could be using the sanctions block as leverage to encourage Malta to toe their line on other international matters.
“There may be upcoming issues at EU or even UN level that the Russian government may want Malta to vote on in one way or another, and this will likely be a topic of discussion at the meeting,” the senior government source said.
Darren Debono and Gordon Debono were hit by US Treasury Department sanctions last year, with businesses and bank accounts impacted.
Darren Debono’s restaurant along Valletta’s Marsamxett Harbour, Scoglitti, was also blacklisted.
Sources said that the bulk of the wealth of the two Maltese players in this racket was not on the island and was believed to be hidden in tax havens outside the EU.
A UN sanctioning would mean that the three men would find it far more difficult to get their hands back on their money, no matter how well it had been hidden away.
That said, the authorities in Malta and abroad were already monitoring the group’s financial movements.
Darren Debono and Gordon Debono were both arrested by Italian police in 2017 shortly after the arrest of Mr Bin Khalifa by Libyan militiamen.
The multi-million fuel smuggling operation would see Maltese ships transport Libyan State fuel out of North Africa and into the European market, with the help of falsified paperwork and mafia contacts.
A two-year investigation by Italian police, codenamed Operation Dirty Oil, blew the lid off the operation after a United Nations’ Panel of Experts on Libya report had detailed the criminal gang’s operations. The network is believed to have smuggled over 80 million kilos of gasoil out of Libya. A Sicilian mafia associate, named Nicola Orazio Romeo, was also mentioned in the paperwork handed to the UN Security Council by Malta, however, he would not face sanctions yet.