This is an extract form an important item.
The US government interfered with a legal transaction inside Europe, but which involved Cuba, which the US has embargoed, because it was denominated in Dollars. The US government confiscated the money involved.
Previously, the US government has used a similar approach to freeze Dollar purchases of oil from Iran.
Since the agreements of 1971 and 1973, OPEC oil is exclusively quoted in US dollars. It has been alleged that the current US-Iran conflict relates largely to the currency of oil sales (See Petrodollar warfare)
This seems like yet another really good reason to end the situation where international trade in many commodities is denominated exclusively in Dollars, and why it should instead be conducted in any convenient currency.
http://cphpost.dk/news/international/us-snubs-out-legal-cigar-transaction
US snubs out legal cigar transaction | The Copenhagen Post | The Danish News in English
Foreign minister intervenes after Danish man loses appeal to have 137,000 kroner returned to him by the Americans Due to the trade embargo, the trade in Cuban cigars is illegal in the USA
Authorities in the US have refused to return 137,000 kroner that was confiscated from a Danish policeman who attempted to legally purchase Cuban cigars from Germany.
Torben Nødskouv intended to resell the cigars through his small business Cigarhuset and made the transaction in dollars with a Hamburg-based distributor. But the transaction, which was automatically routed through the US, was picked up by American authorities who froze the money, arguing that the transaction violated the American trade embargo with Cuba.
Nødskouv appealed after the $20,000 transaction was frozen last autumn, but the money may be permanently lost after he was recently informed that it would not be returned to him.
The intervention of the American authorities in a legal transaction between two European countries has provoked criticism from a range of politicians and experts who argue that the US has overstepped its place in their policing of financial transactions under the guise of fighting terrorism.
…
“It is worrying that the US is extraterritorially applying American legislation to regulate business activities outside of the US,” Søvndal said. “I do not think it is fair that the US intervenes with European businesses, especially with a legal transfer of money between two European countries.”
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