Mr Chavez has also ordered the army to commandeer privately-owned ships, trucks and aircraft to distribute fuel and food.

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Indeed, big, slow-moving ships owned by a collective of wealthy white Americans tend to turn, well, slowly.

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The firm owned three of the four ships it ran across the Channel, which have been tied up in Calais since January.

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That could restrict the market for high-quality disposal to ships that are owned by governments, which tend to be more susceptible to eco-lobbying than private firms.

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The charges are connected with the sale of 16 ships by the state-owned Petromin company to a Norwegian enterprise in the 1990s, prosecutors said.

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Both ships are operated by Costa Crociere SpA, which is owned by the Florida-based Carnival Corp.

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It owned blast furnaces, rolling mills, hopper cars, barges, coal mines, ships, shipyards.

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