Reuters recently reported on the effect of U.S. government sanctions on international shipping:

The United States will target shipping companies that are in breach of sanctions and aggressively enforce measures across the globe to clamp down on such practices, a top U.S. official said...

In one of the biggest sanctions actions taken by the U.S. government since its crackdown on Iranian oil exports, Washington imposed sanctions on Chinese companies in late September for alleged involvement in moving crude oil from Iran...

COSCO Shipping Tanker (Dalian), a subsidiary of China’s state-owned shipping group COSCO, was one of the companies blacklisted. 

COSCO Shipping Tanker (Dalian) was added to the Treasury Department's Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) List on September 25, 2019, along with five individuals and five other entities.

This serves as an important reminder that shipping companies should be screened along with other parties to transactions.  As we previously reported, even shipping vessels may be subject to sanctions.