Daniel sent us this one, and it is a puzzle with uncomfortable edges. Ireland has spent years positioning itself as the moral conscience of Europe when it comes to Israel — the Occupied Territories Bill, the ICJ intervention, the diplomatic broadsides. But newly uncovered trade data tells a parallel story. Irish-origin iron and steel exports to Russia have surged three hundred and forty percent since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began. Meanwhile Dublin has been quietly approving aviation parts to Iran and hosting a growing number of Russian-linked trusts. The question at the center of all this: is this hypocrisy, or is there a coherent — if deeply uncomfortable — logic at work?
The number that grabbed me is forty-seven million euros. That was the value of Irish-origin iron and steel exports to Russia in twenty twenty-five, according to Central Statistics Office data released in May. In twenty twenty-one, before the full-scale invasion, that figure was ten point eight million. This is a deliberate, sustained expansion of trade in a sector with direct military applications.
The timing of the CSO release is not subtle. Ireland is weeks away from assuming the EU Council presidency. High Representative Kaja Kallas is in Dublin today, Tuesday, meeting with Prime Minister Micheál Martin, and she has already said publicly she intends to raise the matter.
She said something striking in Cyprus on Monday. "Wars also end when aggressors run out of money." The implication being that Ireland's continued trade is literally financing the prolongation of the war while the government issues statements condemning it.
The moral choreography is remarkable. One hand signs the sanctions, the other hand ships the steel.
Let me walk through how this pipeline actually works, because the mechanics matter. The key products are seamless steel tubes — HS code seven three zero four — which are used in oil and gas pipelines. But here is where dual-use comes in. Russia's military uses those same tubes for fuel supply lines and for missile casing components. So a product classified as civilian energy infrastructure on the export license is functionally identical to material used in weapons systems.
The EU banned direct export of dual-use goods to Russia in March twenty twenty-two. So how are these shipments still legal?
That is the loophole, and it is not uniquely Irish, but Ireland is particularly good at exploiting it. The goods are not shipped directly to Russia. They are routed through intermediaries — primarily Turkey, which received twenty-two million euros worth in twenty twenty-five, and Kazakhstan, at fifteen million. The steel arrives in Istanbul or Almaty, gets re-exported under new customs codes, and the Irish companies can truthfully say they sold to a Turkish or Kazakh buyer, not a Russian one.
It is sanctions compliance as written, not as intended.
The enforcement capacity to catch this is almost nonexistent. Ireland's Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment has twelve staff dedicated to sanctions enforcement. They processed four thousand seven hundred license applications in twenty twenty-five and conducted twenty-three physical inspections of end-use destinations.
That is not an enforcement regime. That is a suggestion box.
The two largest exporters are Irish Steel Limited, based in Cork, and Shannon Metallurgy Group in Limerick. Neither has been sanctioned, and both maintain their products are for civilian energy infrastructure only. But in April, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project and Lloyd's List intelligence traced a Shannon Metallurgy shipment of five hundred tonnes of high-grade steel tubing that arrived at a port in Murmansk — which is under joint civilian-military administration. Russian customs data obtained by the OCCRP confirmed the shipment.
Five hundred tonnes of steel tubing does not wander into Murmansk by clerical error.
The company has not commented on that specific tracing. But the broader pattern is what matters. Irish companies are legally compliant with EU sanctions as written. The sanctions regime has a civilian end-use carve-out that is nearly impossible to verify, especially when the enforcement body has twelve people and a budget that probably would not cover a decent office Christmas party.
The Prime Minister's defense of this is worth quoting. Micheál Martin described the alumina plant Aughinish — which we will get to — as part of a "wider European supply chain" and warned that sanctions could drive up inflation and affect a thousand direct jobs. His exact words were, "The whole principle of sanctions is we don't damage ourselves more than Russia, or that they don't become self-defeating.
Which is a legitimate principle. Sanctions that cripple your own economy while Russia shrugs are bad policy. The question is whether that principle is being applied consistently, or whether it becomes a blanket excuse for maintaining profitable trade relationships with a country actively bombing civilians.
Let us talk about Aughinish Alumina, because that story broke wide open this week. Euronews published a piece on Monday, June eighth, detailing the OCCRP investigation from March. What is the basic supply chain here?
Aughinish Alumina, based in western Ireland, is the largest alumina refinery in Europe. Alumina is the raw material used to produce aluminum. Aughinish sells alumina to Russian smelters owned by its parent company, United Company Rusal. Rusal then sells the aluminum to a trader that supplies sanctioned defense manufacturers. The OCCRP traced Irish alumina to the Russian trader, though they could not trace it to a specific weapons product — the supply chain gets opaque at that stage.
The alumina goes from Ireland to Rusal to a trader to defense manufacturers, and somewhere in that chain the trail goes cold. But the direction of travel is clear.
The scale is enormous. Aughinish has said alumina exports to Russia represented about forty-five percent of all sales in twenty twenty-five and it expects a similar share by the end of this year. They blamed a clerical error for a figure of eighty-three percent in the first three months of this year — a clerical error that somehow inflated the number by nearly double.
A clerical error of that magnitude in a company that size is the statistical equivalent of finding a live penguin in your filing cabinet.
The plant has been lobbying the Irish government heavily to deter sanctions. RTÉ News obtained confidential documents showing Aughinish raised the prospect of nationalization if sanctions were imposed — essentially telling Dublin, if you cut us off from Russia, you will have to bail us out.
Which would make it the Irish government's problem, not Rusal's. That is a negotiating position, not a warning.
It appears to be working. Martin has been notably reluctant to push for alumina to be included in the EU's twenty-first sanctions package, which is being drafted now. A group of thirty-nine MEPs has called for an alumina ban. The Estonian foreign minister, Margus Tsahkna, has voiced support. But sanctions require unanimity, and the Commission is reluctant to propose measures it knows will be voted down.
Ireland has, in effect, a veto over its own sanctions enforcement. It can say, we will not support including alumina in the package, and the Commission will not even propose it because they know Dublin would block it.
The Ukrainian embassy in Ireland issued a statement last week expressing "serious concern" and listed the specific Russian weapons that contain aluminum — ballistic missiles, hypersonic missiles, Shahed drones. Their statement was remarkably diplomatic. Ukraine said it "fully recognizes the importance of protecting jobs, communities, and industrial competitiveness," but added that "Russia's continued war of aggression requires constant vigilance to ensure that commercial activities do not directly or indirectly contribute to sustaining the military capabilities of a state engaged in a brutal and unprovoked war against a sovereign European nation.
That is the sound of a country under bombardment trying very hard not to alienate an ally while pointing out that the ally is supplying the bomb-makers.
Now let me shift to Iran, because that channel is less discussed but in some ways more legally problematic. In November twenty twenty-four, the Irish Aviation Authority issued a license for the export of eight point three million euros in aircraft components to Iran Air. This is despite Iran being under EU aviation sanctions since twenty ten.
What kind of components?
Engine turbine blades and cockpit avionics. The license was approved under a humanitarian carve-out — the parts were classified as safety-critical spares, the argument being that civilian aircraft need maintenance to avoid crashes.
Which is a real concern. You do not want passenger jets falling out of the sky because they cannot get spare parts.
But investigative reporting by Iran International in January this year revealed that forty percent of those parts were subsequently transferred to Mahan Air. Mahan Air is linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and is under full EU sanctions — no carve-outs, no exceptions. The parts were tracked via Iranian customs manifests and IATA flight logs.
The humanitarian argument was used to open a door, and forty percent of what went through that door ended up with the IRGC.
This gets to a pattern that is not about malice. It is about structural capacity. Ireland's economy is uniquely dependent on foreign direct investment and trade intermediation. Its corporate tax rate and common law legal system make it a natural hub for global supply chains. When the EU imposes sanctions, Irish-based trading companies are often the most efficient at finding legal workarounds — not because they are malicious, but because they have the legal expertise and financial infrastructure to do so.
The system is optimized for frictionless trade. Sanctions are friction. The system routes around them.
The SPV structure is the clearest example. A Special Purpose Vehicle is an Irish-registered company that can hold assets on behalf of a beneficial owner whose identity is hidden behind a nominee director. The Central Bank of Ireland's twenty twenty-five Financial Stability Review identified forty-seven Irish-domiciled trusts with Russian beneficial ownership, up from twelve in twenty twenty-two.
In four years, the number nearly quadrupled while sanctions were supposedly tightening. These trusts are technically compliant because the beneficial owner is not listed on any public document. The nominee director — often a law firm partner in Dublin — is the legal face. The actual oligarch is invisible.
This is the financial equivalent of those steel tubes going through Turkey. The form is clean, the substance is not. And it is worth comparing Ireland to other small EU states that show similar patterns. Malta, Luxembourg, Cyprus — all have financial services sectors that benefit from regulatory arbitrage. Ireland's version is the SPV and the trading company.
Ireland is the one that has appointed itself the moral vanguard on Israel. That is the asymmetry that makes this newsworthy. If Malta were lecturing the world about human rights while facilitating Russian trusts, the story would be the same, but Malta is not doing that.
The trade with Belarus is another data point. Ireland's trade with Belarus hit a hundred and twelve million euros in twenty twenty-five, up a hundred and eighty percent from twenty twenty-one. Belarus is under EU sanctions for facilitating the Russian invasion and for its own internal repression. Yet Irish exports are growing — a significant portion in machinery and electronic equipment, again dual-use categories. The CSO data does not specify end-use, and the enforcement unit with its twelve staff is not checking.
The picture that emerges is not a single smoking gun. It is a pattern. Steel to Russia via Turkey and Kazakhstan. Alumina to Rusal. Aviation parts to Iran that end up with the IRGC. Machinery to Belarus. SPVs for oligarchs. Each individual piece can be explained away — a civilian end-use loophole, a humanitarian carve-out, a clerical error. But taken together, it describes a country whose economic structure is fundamentally at odds with its foreign policy rhetoric.
I want to be precise about what that structure is. Ireland's GDP is heavily influenced by multinational corporations that book profits through Irish subsidiaries. The actual domestic economy is much smaller. But the trading infrastructure — the legal firms, the accounting practices, the logistics networks — is real and world-class. It exists to facilitate cross-border commerce. Sanctions are an impediment to cross-border commerce. The infrastructure adapts.
When the EU says "sanction Russia," the Irish trading apparatus hears "find the compliant route to Russia." Not because anyone is sitting in a boardroom saying "let us help Putin," but because the incentives point that way. A trading company that stops trading loses revenue. A law firm that stops structuring SPVs loses billable hours. A refinery that stops selling alumina to its parent company loses forty-five percent of its sales. The individual actors are behaving rationally within the rules as written. The problem is that the rules as written are full of holes.
The government has no incentive to close those holes because closing them would damage the economy. Martin basically said this out loud: sanctions should not damage us more than Russia.
Which brings me to the transparency paradox. Ireland's trade data is unusually transparent. The CSO publishes monthly data with a sixty-day lag. Any analyst with an internet connection can see the three hundred and forty percent surge in steel exports. That data was visible in Irish statistics eight months before it appeared in Eurostat aggregates.
Ireland is simultaneously the most transparent and the most evasive. The data is there, but the enforcement is not. And that transparency can be used as a leading indicator. If you want to track sanctions evasion, Irish trade data will show you patterns before anyone else's data does. The surge to Turkey and Kazakhstan was visible in the CSO numbers long before it became a scandal.
That is a practical takeaway. If you want to know where sanctions evasion is headed, watch Irish trade statistics.
The US has a mechanism for this that the EU lacks. The Bureau of Industry and Security runs a validated end-user program. Before a dual-use export can be approved, the importing country's government has to certify the end-use — not just the buyer, the government. That shifts the verification burden from twelve people in Dublin to the entire diplomatic and customs apparatus of the receiving country.
If the receiving country's government is the one doing the diverting — as with Iran — that certification becomes either impossible to obtain or a diplomatic liability for them.
The EU's fourteenth sanctions package, expected in the third quarter of this year, includes a proposal for a trade transparency mechanism that would require all member states to publish beneficial ownership data for companies involved in sanctioned goods. If that passes, it would directly impact the Irish SPV structure. Those forty-seven trusts with Russian beneficial ownership would have to be disclosed.
Will Ireland support it?
That is the open question. Ireland has supported sanctions packages broadly — it has voted for all twenty existing packages. But when specific measures threaten Irish economic interests, Dublin has been notably quiet. The alumina ban is the test case right now. If Ireland blocks it, that signals the economic red line is real.
That would be the moment the contradiction becomes undeniable. You cannot lead the charge on sanctions against one country while vetoing sanctions that would cost your own industries money.
Let me add one more layer. Ireland's corporate tax regime and legal system were built to attract foreign investment. They succeeded spectacularly. But the same features that attract Apple and Google also attract shell companies, SPVs, and trading intermediaries that operate in the gray zones of international commerce. You cannot design a system that is maximally attractive to legitimate multinationals without also making it attractive to entities that want to minimize scrutiny.
The tax haven and the transparency champion are the same building with different signage. And Ireland has added a layer of moral advocacy that makes the tension more visible. The Occupied Territories Bill, the ICJ intervention, the statements from the Taoiseach — these are not quiet diplomatic notes. They are public, moral declarations.
I should note, the Occupied Territories Bill was landmark legislation. It banned trade with Israeli settlements in the West Bank. It was the first such law in the EU. That took genuine political courage.
Which makes the Russia trade all the more striking. The same government that said trading with settlements is morally unacceptable is trading with a country that is leveling Ukrainian cities.
The government's defense would be that the Occupied Territories Bill was about goods produced in occupied territory, a specific legal category under international law. The Russia trade involves goods not subject to the same legal prohibition. That is a legally coherent distinction.
Legally coherent and morally incoherent can coexist. That is the theme of this entire episode.
I think the moral incoherence is what bothers people most. The Ukrainian embassy statement was so carefully worded because they cannot afford to alienate an EU member state. But the subtext was unmistakable. You are helping to kill our civilians while giving speeches about international law.
Let us talk about the Irish domestic reaction, because this is not going unnoticed in Ireland itself.
The Irish Times and The Ditch have been leading the reporting. Civil society groups have been vocal. But public opinion is complicated. Aughinish Alumina employs a thousand people directly and supports many more indirectly in County Limerick. The plant has been there for decades. When you tell people their jobs might disappear because of a sanctions decision made in Brussels, the moral calculus gets harder.
That is not unique to Ireland. Every sanctions decision involves trade-offs between moral goals and economic costs. The question is whether those trade-offs are being made honestly and consistently. If you are willing to accept economic pain to sanction Israel over settlements, why is economic pain to sanction Russia over mass civilian bombardment a bridge too far?
The cynic's answer is that sanctioning Israeli settlements costs Ireland very little economically. There is not a major Irish refinery dependent on settlement trade. Sanctioning Russian alumina would cost real jobs in Limerick. The moral calculus becomes stricter when the price is higher. But there is also a structural answer. The EU sanctions regime against Russia is a collective decision-making process. Ireland is one of twenty-seven members. If Ireland blocks an alumina ban, the ban does not happen. But the Occupied Territories Bill was a unilateral Irish decision. Ireland had full control over it.
Ireland is more morally assertive when acting alone than when acting within a collective where it can hide behind the need for unanimity — or where it can credibly claim that its individual veto is necessary to protect its national interest.
"We support sanctions in principle, but this specific measure would be disproportionate." That is a common refrain in EU sanctions debates, and Ireland is not the only country that uses it. Germany on gas, Hungary on oil, Ireland on alumina. Every country has its red line, and the EU sanctions process is designed to accommodate those red lines because the alternative is no sanctions at all.
Which brings us back to the core question. Is this hypocrisy, or is there a coherent logic? I think the answer is both. It is hypocritical in the sense that Ireland's moral rhetoric far exceeds its willingness to bear costs. But it is also logically coherent in the sense that every small, trade-dependent economy faces the same tension between values and interests. Ireland is just more transparent about it — both in its data and in its rhetoric.
The rhetoric makes the transparency more damning. If Ireland were quiet about human rights, the trade data would still be there, but nobody would notice the contradiction. It is the combination of loud moral advocacy and quiet economic complicity that creates the story.
Like a vegan who lectures you about animal cruelty while wearing leather shoes. The shoes would be unremarkable on anyone else. And the shoes, in this case, are made of Russian steel and Iranian avionics.
There is a further dimension here. Ireland's relationships with other countries that have poor human rights records. Beyond Russia and Iran, what does the pattern look like? The Belarus trade is one piece. But Ireland has also been notably reluctant to criticize certain states with poor human rights records when those states are significant trade partners. China is the obvious example — pharmaceuticals, technology, agri-food. Criticism of China's human rights record from Dublin is measured, to put it politely.
Whereas criticism of Israel is unrestrained. And it is not just China. Ireland's criticism of Saudi Arabia, of Egypt, of various Gulf states — all of which have human rights records beyond those seen in democracies — is notably muted compared to its Israel posture.
There is a term for this in international relations. Selective moral outrage. You pick the target that is politically safe and rhetorically satisfying, and you go after it with full force, while maintaining cordial relations with states whose conduct is objectively worse but whose trade is more valuable. Israel is a uniquely attractive target for this in certain European political cultures. It is a democracy, so criticizing it does not carry the same risks as criticizing authoritarian states. It is a small country, so there is no economic cost to sanctions. And it is a Jewish state, which adds a layer of political complexity.
The prompt is not shy about it. Ireland's moral superiority, it says, seems to take issue with the comport of seemingly no other state. That is a pointed observation.
It is, and many people in Ireland would push back strongly. They would argue that Ireland has a long tradition of supporting Palestinian rights rooted in its own colonial history, that the criticism of Israel is principled, not selective. And there is genuine historical resonance there. Ireland's experience of British rule does create a cultural sympathy for peoples under occupation.
That sympathy does not seem to extend to Ukrainians under Russian occupation, at least not to the point of sacrificing alumina revenue.
The counterargument would be that Ireland has taken in Ukrainian refugees, provided humanitarian aid, and supported EU sanctions packages. The alumina issue is a specific economic trade-off, not a blanket indifference to Ukrainian suffering. That is a fair point. Ireland is not indifferent to Ukraine.
The steel tubes and the alumina are not humanitarian aid. They are industrial inputs to a war machine. The refugees are a response to the consequences of the war. The trade is a contribution to the war itself. It is like donating to the burn unit while selling matches to the arsonist.
That is a compressed image that lands.
Let us step back and ask the systemic question. If Ireland — a country with genuine democratic institutions, a free press, and a vocal civil society — cannot align its trade with its moral rhetoric, what does that say about the feasibility of values-based foreign policy for any small, open economy?
It says that values-based foreign policy is only possible when the values are cost-free. The moment moral commitments impose economic costs, the domestic political calculus shifts. Politicians answer to voters. Voters answer to their paychecks. A thousand jobs in Limerick will always outweigh an abstract principle in a cabinet meeting. And that is not an Irish failing. It is a democratic feature. Democracies are accountable to their populations. Populations prioritize material wellbeing. Values-based foreign policy is a luxury good.
Which is why authoritarian states often find it easier to maintain consistent foreign policy postures. They do not have to answer to voters. China can sanction Taiwan and lose trade without worrying about an election. Democracies have a built-in tension between values and interests that authoritarians do not. So the Irish case is not an outlier. It is a particularly vivid illustration of a universal democratic tension.
The vividness comes from the transparency. We know about the steel tubes and the alumina because the CSO data is public and the OCCRP did the investigative work. In less transparent countries, the same patterns exist but are invisible. Ireland's problem is not that it is uniquely compromised. It is that it is uniquely observable.
Which circles back to the practical takeaway. If you want to understand sanctions evasion, watch Ireland. Not because Ireland is the worst offender, but because Ireland is the most measurable one.
For policymakers, the lesson is that sanctions regimes need to be designed with the assumption that regulated entities will find the most compliant route to their commercial objectives. The civilian end-use loophole is not a bug that can be patched with better enforcement. It is a feature deliberately included because member states wanted to protect their domestic industries. Closing it requires political will, not just better data.
The EU's twenty-first sanctions package will be the test. If alumina is included, it signals that the political will is shifting. If it is not, it signals that the economic red lines are still determinative.
Ireland's EU presidency, which starts in July, will put Dublin in the awkward position of chairing the very body that is debating whether to sanction Irish industry. The presidency is supposed to be an honest broker. That is a difficult role to play when your own alumina refinery is the subject of the debate.
The Euronews piece noted that Kaja Kallas intends to raise the matter directly with Martin today. The readout from that meeting will be interesting.
It will, though readouts from such meetings are typically anodyne. "Full and frank exchange of views" is diplomatic code for "we argued.
"Constructive dialogue" means "nobody threw anything.
One more structural point. Ireland's common law system is a significant factor here. Most EU member states use civil law. Common law jurisdictions — Ireland, the UK, Malta, Cyprus — have legal traditions that are more flexible in structuring complex financial arrangements. Trusts, SPVs, nominee directorships — these are common law instruments. Ireland's role as a hub for Russian-linked SPVs is partly a function of its legal heritage.
The very features that made Ireland attractive to US multinationals — common law, low tax, English-speaking, EU membership — also make it attractive to actors who want to move money through a jurisdiction that looks reputable. The system does not judge.
The processing is profitable. Legal fees, accounting fees, management fees — the entire ecosystem benefits from volume. The nationality of the beneficial owner is not a line item on the invoice.
What would change the incentives? What would make it more costly for Irish firms to facilitate Russian trade than to refuse it?
One, reputational risk. If the scandal grows and "Irish Steel" becomes synonymous with "Russian missiles" in public perception, the commercial calculus shifts. Two, regulatory risk. If the EU closes the civilian end-use loophole and requires end-use certification, the compliance burden becomes prohibitive. Three, legal risk. If evidence emerges that specific shipments were knowingly diverted to military use, that is sanctions evasion, which carries criminal penalties. And four, political risk. If the Irish public decides the moral cost outweighs the economic benefit, the government's position becomes untenable.
That is the hardest to predict. Public opinion on this is not well-polled. The Irish Times and The Ditch have an audience, but it is not clear how much the average voter knows or cares about the CSO trade data. Aughinish Alumina is a major employer in a region without many alternatives. The political economy is real.
Which is why the government's defense focuses on jobs. "We don't damage ourselves more than Russia." It is an argument designed to resonate with voters more worried about their mortgage than about the supply chain ethics of seamless steel tubing. And that argument works until it does not. The moment a news story connects a specific Irish shipment to a specific Russian weapon that killed specific Ukrainian civilians, the moral calculus changes. Abstractions become concrete. The OCCRP investigation stopped short of that connection, but the direction of reporting suggests it is only a matter of time.
The Murmansk shipment is close. Five hundred tonnes of high-grade steel tubing arriving at a joint civilian-military port. The next investigative step is tracing what happened to that steel after it arrived. And if that tracing leads to a weapons system, the government's position collapses overnight. You cannot say "civilian energy infrastructure" when the steel is in a missile casing.
The Iran case is already past that threshold. Forty percent of Ireland-licensed aviation parts ended up with an IRGC-linked airline. That is not a loophole issue. That is a failure of end-use verification. And it raises questions about the Irish Aviation Authority's licensing process. Did they ask for end-use certification? Did they check? Or did they approve the license and move on?
With twelve enforcement staff processing four thousand seven hundred applications, the answer is probably "approve and move on." Under-resourced enforcement is a way of having sanctions on paper without having them in practice. It is the regulatory equivalent of a sign that says "no trespassing" on an unlocked gate. The sign is there for the benefit of people who want to believe the gate is closed.
I want to be careful not to overstate. The Irish government is not monolithic. There are officials genuinely committed to sanctions enforcement and frustrated by the resource constraints. There are politicians who have raised these issues. The Dáil has had debates. Civil society is active. The picture is not one of uniform complicity.
The outcome is the same. The steel flows, the alumina flows, the SPVs multiply. Intentions are not outcomes.
That is the uncomfortable conclusion. Ireland's intentions — its stated values, its diplomatic rhetoric, its self-image as a human rights champion — are not matched by its outcomes. The trade data tells a story that the speeches do not.
Which brings us to what listeners can actually do with this information. The prompt is not just asking for an exposé. It is asking for understanding.
There are practical tools. The Irish CSO has an interactive tool called Trade in Goods by Country and Commodity, available at cso.It is free, updated monthly. You can track exports to Russia, Iran, Belarus in real time. The sixty-day lag means you are seeing patterns almost as they happen. For investors and analysts, Irish trade data is a leading indicator of sanctions evasion patterns that will show up in Eurostat months later.
For policymakers, the US validated end-user program is a model worth studying. Require importing governments to certify end-use. Shift the verification burden from under-resourced national agencies to the diplomatic apparatus of the receiving country. It is not perfect, but it is better than twelve people and twenty-three inspections.
The EU's trade transparency mechanism, if it passes in the fourteenth sanctions package, would also help. Mandatory beneficial ownership disclosure for companies involved in sanctioned goods would make the SPV structure much harder to maintain. Whether it passes depends on Ireland and other small states. They will face a choice between protecting their financial services industries and maintaining the credibility of the EU sanctions regime.
Now: Hilbert's daily fun fact.
Hilbert: In the nineteen sixties, Guyanese sugar plantation workers preserved fresh fish by packing it in barrels of rum mixed with brown sugar and lime juice — a technique inherited from indentured Indian laborers. The resulting product, known locally as "rum fish," could keep for up to eighteen months without refrigeration. Modern vacuum-sealed frozen fish, by comparison, has a recommended shelf life of six to twelve months before quality degradation begins.
Rum fish outlasts modern vacuum sealing by fifty percent.
The nineteenth century beats the freezer aisle.
This has been My Weird Prompts. Thanks to our producer, Hilbert Flumingtop. If you want to dig into the trade data yourself, head to cso.ie and look up Trade in Goods by Country and Commodity. Find us at myweirdprompts.com or wherever you get your podcasts.
We will be back next week. Until then, watch the Irish numbers.
