Suez Canal chief: Vessel Confiscated amid financial dispute

Suez Canal chief: Vessel Confiscated amid financial dispute
May 12, 2021, 11:17 am

CAIRO (AP) — Egyptian authorities Confiscated a massive cargo vessel that blocked the Suez Canal last month amid a financial dispute with its owner, the canal chief and a judicial official said Tuesday.

Lt. Gen. Osama Rabie said the hulking Ever Given would not be permitted to leave the country until a compensation is settled on with the vessel’s Japanese owner, Shoei Kisen Kaisha Ltd.

He told Egypt’s state-run television late on Monday “The vessel is now officially confiscated. They do not want to pay anything."

Rabie did not say how much money the canal authority was asking. However, a judicial official said it asked $900 million at least according to the Ahram daily.

That amount takes into account the salvage operation, costs of stalled canal traffic and lost transit fees for the week that the Ever Given blocked the canal.

The official said the order to confiscate the vessel was released on May 10 by a court in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia, and that the vessel’s crew has been informed on May 11.

He said prosecutors in Ismailia also opened a separate investigation into what led the Ever Given to run aground. The official talked on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief media.

Rabie said negotiations were still ongoing to reach a settlement on compensation.

He warned last week in an interview with The Associated Press that bringing the case before a court would cause more harm to the vessel’s owner than settling with the canal’s management.

Litigation could be complex, since the vessel is owned by a Japanese firm, operated by a Taiwanese shipper, and flagged in Panama.

The Panama-flagged ship that carries some $3.5 billion in cargo between Asia and Europe ran aground on March 23 in the narrow, man-made canal dividing continental Africa from the Asian Sinai Peninsula.

The vessel had crashed into the bank of a single-lane stretch of the canal about 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) north of the southern entrance, near the city of Suez.

On March 29, salvage teams freed the Ever Given, ending a crisis that had blocked one of the world’s most vital waterways and halted billions of dollars a day in maritime commerce.

Rabie, the canal chief, said that there was no wrongdoing by the canal authority. He declined to discuss possible causes, including the ship’s velocity and the winds that battered it during a sandstorm.

When asked whether the ship’s owner was faulty, he said: “Absolutely, he was.”

Rabie said the conclusion of the authority investigation was expected on Thursday.

Source: apnews

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