BREAKING! US special forces board tanker in North Atlantic

[Roma]

Just spitballing ideas here.  There have been reports that Venezuela's silver reserves have been moved to bypass sanctions.  Maybe the cargo was precious metals.

[IgnorantGod]

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I agree with Andy, you're not going to haul any substantial ammount of people inside the hold of a tanker. However, that doesn't mean it might not have had part of it modified. Yet again, it would be a pretty expensive way just to transport a few illegal migrants.
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Rainbows
Jane

If it's not human, then it's alien, there can be no other alternatives.

[andy06shake]

I've had a suspicion for quite some time that the illegal migrants crossing the channel are just a deflection to a certain extent.
I remember reading a story some time ago by a man in Cornwall who would regularly see a trawler type boat not far off the Cornish coast. The man would take the clifftop path home late at night after finishing his shift. The trawler would launch one of thise dinghy's full of men. It would land in the small cove below the cliffs and a white van would appear and drive off with the men. The dinghy then returned to the trawler. 
He saw this on a number of occasions and reported it to the coast guard and police. Nobody did a darn thing about it.
I agree with Andy, you're not going to haul any substantial ammount of people inside the hold of a tanker. However, that doesn't mean it might not have had part of it modified. Yet again, it would be a pretty expensive way just to transport a few illegal migrants.
It originally went to Venezuela from Iran. Did it actually dock and discharge 'anything' in Venezuela, or was it loading up with 'something'?
Rainbows
Jane

Yeah, it would be so much easier to simply retrofit containers on a cargo vessel as opposed to a toxic Oil tanker if people smuggling was the goal.