During the summer, the Swedish-flagged
ATLANTIC CARTIER and ATLANTIC CONVEYOR, the two last G3 vessels operated by the
Italian Grimaldi Group’s subsidiary Atlantic Container Line (ACL), were sold
for demolition. The German competent authorities were alerted about the
imminent illegal export of the ships from the port of Hamburg and prompted to
take action to stop the vessels from departing. Despite the warnings and the
clear signs that the ships were destined for scrap, the authorities did not
halt the ships. The ATLANTIC CARTIER arrived in Alang, India, on the 20th of
September, and the ATLANTIC CONVEYOR hit the beach on the 7th of October, after
vessel tracking providers curiously indicated that the container carrier was
“Steaming 4 Sunshine”.
International waste laws and the EU Waste
Shipment Regulation are usually circumvented by ship owners who falsely declare
that end-of-life ships are in continued operational use when leaving a port,
thereby concealing the fact that they are destined for scrapping and have,
therefore, become a waste. The cases of the CARTIER and the CONVEYOR are no exception.
The German authorities were not the only ones
that have been contacted before the vessels’ final voyage. Also authorities
from Canada and the UK, countries through which the CARTIER and the CONVEYOR
sailed before arriving in Hamburg for their last EU port call, knew that the
ships had been sold to the beach; yet, when questioned, ACL did not reveal that
the ships were sold for breaking. Once having left the EU, both vessels
operated for a short while in South-Eastern Africa – still under the same name,
flag and ownership – waiting for the attention on them to fade. During that
time, ACL contacted the Swedish authorities asking for advice on which steps
should be taken if the company decided to recycle the ships. Despite the
recommendations of Sweden to scrap the vessels in the EU or in an OECD country,
there was no way to ensure that these recommendations would be followed, since
at that point the ships were no longer in the EU. Rather, it is clear that this
communication was a way for ACL to make it seem like the company had acted
diligently by seeking advice from the flag-state, as well as to fraudulently
make it seem as the decision to dispose of the container carriers was only
taken once outside of EU waters.
According to the German port authorities,
there was no evidence base for the arrest of the vessels, even though the logos
of both the CARTIER and the CONVEYOR had been painted over before the final
voyage. Moreover, it was well-known within the industry that these two sister
ships would be sold for breaking in the summer, as ACL itself indicated that
the ships would be scrapped on the cash-buyer GMS’ website last year. In light
of this, the Platform has recently sent a letter to the German authorities
asking them to hold Grimaldi Group’s ACL accountable for having breached
European waste laws.
End-of-life sales to South Asian yards are
done with the help of a cash-buyer, a company specialised in trading
end-of-life vessels to the dirty and dangerous beaching yards. It is not the
first time that Grimaldi Group sends its ships to be broken on the beaches: the
ATLANTIC CONCERT and ATLANTIC COMPASS were beached in Alang last year. In 2016,
during an official meeting in Rome, the Platform raised serious concerns
regarding the more than 90 Italian-owned end-of-life vessels that had been sent
to dirty and dangerous scrapping yards in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan in the
last seven years. The Platform advised the Italian Ship Owners Association,
including representatives of Grimaldi Group, to stop selling their end-of-life
vessels to unscrupulous cash buyers, and urged the Italian ship owners to
ensure the safe and environmentally sound recycling of their ships. Hence, it
is clear that the Platform’s message has not been taken into consideration.
Source: hellenic
shipping news. 12 October 2017
No comments:
Post a Comment