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Tunisia: the wrecked tanker was empty, the risk of pollution averted

2022-04-22T15:45:24.719Z


The Xelo sank on April 16 in Tunisian waters. The authorities had initially indicated that it was carrying 750 tonnes of diesel.


Tunisian authorities announced Friday that the tanker wrecked on April 16 off Tunisia was empty, ruling out any risk of pollution, after initially indicating that the ship was carrying 750 tonnes of diesel.

If an environmental disaster has been avoided, gray areas remain on the ship's activities and the circumstances of the sinking.

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The crew - four Turks, a Georgian captain and two Azerbaijanis - was placed under arrest on Friday, Mohamed Karray, spokesman for the Gabes prosecutor's office which is investigating the sinking, told AFP.

"

The Xelo ship which sank in the Gulf of Gabès (south-east) does not contain diesel and its tanks are empty

", indicated the Ministry of the Environment, adding that "

it poses no risk of pollution

" .

.

Tunisian Navy Captain Mazeri Letayef, who heads a crisis unit in Gabès, told AFP that "

the four tanks are filled with seawater

", according to what Tunisian divers and their colleagues have observed. Italians from a pollution control ship that arrived on the spot on Tuesday.

"Hammer Blows"

It may be that the ship is not actually active in the transport of fuels

”, indicated Captain Letayef, while the Ministry of the Environment announced on April 16 that the tanker contained 750 tons of diesel, raising fears an oil slick.

According to Captain Letayef, devices on the deck of the ship were torn off and "

the GPS allowing its location was destroyed with hammer blows

".

The Xelo, en route to Malta according to the Tunisian authorities, sank on April 16 in Tunisian waters where it had taken refuge the day before due to bad weather.

According to Tunis, the boat, flying the flag of Equatorial Guinea, had left the Egyptian port of Damietta, which the Egyptian port authorities have denied.

For some unknown reason, this 58 meter long and 9 meter wide tanker, built in 1977, started to take on water.

Navy forces evacuated the crew before the ship sank nearly 20 meters deep.

Tunisian justice is investigating the causes of the sinking and the nature of the oil tanker's activity.

The incoherent route of the ship, located in Sfax at the beginning of April but whose trace was lost from the 8th to the 15th until it sent distress signals, and the disappearance in the sinking of the " bill of

lading

", a document informing about its route and the nature of its cargo fuel doubts.

"Floating gas station"

Equatorial Guinea announced Thursday the suspension of 395 ships flying the flag of this country in an "

illegal

" manner.

"

Equatorial Guinea's flag cannot be the face of international fraud

," Vice President Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue tweeted.

Tunisian media and experts recalled the proximity of the Gulf of Gabes to northwestern Libya, a major oil-producing country, whose coasts have been the scene of hydrocarbon trafficking in recent years.

Read alsoTunisia:

“no leak”

of diesel from the wrecked tanker

For Rafaa Tabib, expert in geopolitics and specialist in trafficking in Libya, "

it was a floating service station selling (illegally, editor's note) hydrocarbons to the many ships transiting through the Sicily Channel

".

This type of trafficking has "

three main actors: the Italian mafia, companies with an unclear legal status in Malta and Libyan militias operating in the Zawiya sector, where the country's largest refinery is located

", explained Rafaa Tabib to the AFP.

According to him, in this area, a powerful militia "

injects 120,000 barrels of contraband oil per day on the market, or a tenth of national production

".

For this expert, the ship, "

a raft at the end of its life, which did not carry enough fuel oil for a real voyage, was scuttled by its crew voluntarily

", perhaps to escape its radiation by Guinea or "

to erase other traffic

”.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2022-04-22

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