UNITED NATIONS, Aug 15 (APP): UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has warned that time was running out to prevent a decaying tanker stranded off the coast of Yemen from dumping its load of 1.1 million barrels of oil into the Red Sea.
“The aging tanker has had almost no maintenance since 2015 and risks causing a major oil spill, explosion or fire that would have catastrophic environmental and humanitarian consequences for Yemen and the region,” the Secretary-General’s Spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, as he sought from the Houthis group, which controls the area where the vessel is moored, to allow the UN to make an assessment.
More than a month ago, Houthi officials said they would agree to allow a U.N. mission to conduct a technical assessment and whatever initial repairs might be feasible on the Safer tanker. But the United Nations is still waiting for formal authorization.
In his statement, the UN chief said that a spill would cause the closure of the port of Hudaydah, a lifeline for millions of Yemenis who depend on imports of humanitarian aid.
In particular, a potential oil leak into the Red Sea would severely harm Red Sea ecosystems relied on by 30 million people across the region, Dujarric said. “It would moreover force the closure of Hudaydah port for many months, which would exacerbate Yemen’s already severe economic crisis and cut off millions of people from access to food and other essential commodities.”
The Safer has been stranded off the coast of Yemen since the country’s Houthi rebel group captured the nearby coastline in 2015. Despite promises to allow a team of UN inspectors to visit the supertanker, the rebels have been accused of failing to meet their words with action.
In late May 2020, seawater entered the tanker’s engine compartment. While a temporary fix was applied, it raised concern over the risks of an oil spill that holds the potential to unleash four times as much oil into the sea than was spilled from the Exxon Valdez tanker in 1989, according to the UN.
Spokesman Dujarric said the Secretary-General “urged” the removal of obstacles to mitigate the dangers posed by the Safer tanker without delay.
“He specifically calls for granting independent technical experts unconditional access to the tanker to assess its condition and conduct any possible initial repairs,” he said.
“The assessment will provide crucial scientific evidence for the next steps to be taken in order to avert catastrophe”, Dujarric explained.
On Tuesday, international environmental group Greenpeace wrote a letter to the Secretary-General, calling on the UN to make the situation its top priority and use its “full diplomatic and technical capacity to carry out an urgent on-board technical assessment to determine what repairs are needed to make the vessel at least temporarily safe.”
And in mid-July, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) chief, Inger Andersen, told the Security Council that the clock was ticking for getting a UN team of experts aboard the Safer, before it spills its cargo of 1.148 million barrels of light crude oil into the Red Sea, triggering what would likely then be an “environmental, economic and humanitarian catastrophe”.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has described the ship as a “ticking time bomb” and has called for the Houthis to grant the UN access to the vessel.
