The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) has charged ten defendants and arrested one with conspiring to violate the International Economic Emergency Powers Act for their roles in a scheme to evade sanctions imposed on PDVSA - Petróleos de Venezuela by obtaining US aircraft parts.
According to a DOJ statement dated April 22, after learning of the US sanctions imposed on Venezuela’s state-owned oil company in January 2019, the charged individuals “devised a scheme to illegally procure aircraft parts, including Honeywell Aerospace Turbofan engines, from the United States to service PDVSA’s aircraft fleet in Venezuela, in violation of US sanctions and export controls.”
A Costa Rican company, Novax Group SA, and a Spanish company, Aerofalcon SL, were allegedly used as third parties to smuggle the parts to PDVSA. Four individuals from the Venezuelan state-owned oil & gas firm were charged as well as four from Novax and two from Aerofalcon. These two companies were sanctioned with export restrictions last year, ch-aviation reported at the time.
According to the new indictment, reviewed by ch-aviation, PDVSA acquired 26 aircraft tyres in two separate batches for an undisclosed amount, one Dassault Falcon Honeywell Turbofan Engine for USD837,000, and several aircraft parts for undisclosed amounts, and exchanged two broken engines for two new Honeywell Turbofan engines for EUR3.39 million euros (USD3.64 million), among other criminal acts. These spare parts were routed through Novax and Aerofalcon to avoid being detected as they headed for Venezuela.
ch-aviation has reached out to Novax Group for comment, while Aerofalcon was unreachable.
PDVSA’s fleet comprises eight aircraft, including one Falcon 2000EX/EASY/LX, four Falcon 50s, and three Falcon 900s. Seven of the eight are powered by Honeywell Aeroespace’s TFE731 engines, the ch-aviation fleets module shows.
