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A30 world news
Dialuna 29 Maart 2021

No timeline given for extracting wedged ship from Suez Canal

were scheduled to arrive in
Egypt on Sunday.
Egypt Prime Minister Mus-
tafa Madbouly called the
ship’s predicament “a very
extraordinary incident,” in
his first public comments on
the blockage.

The Suez Canal Author-
ity organized the first me-
dia trip Saturday to the site
where the vessel was stuck.
From a distance, a flotilla of
tugboats and other salvage
equipment appeared minus-
cule compared to the vessel, a
reminder of the scale of effort
needed to reopen the canal.
Bernhard Schulte Shipman-
agement said Friday that its
initial investigation showed
the vessel ran aground due to
strong winds and ruled out
(AP) — A giant container Suez. a high tide might give the using a combination of heavy mechanical or engine failure.
ship remained stuck side- Rabei said he could not pre- vesslela boost. tugboats, dredging and high However, Rabei seemed to
ways in Egypt’s Suez Ca- dict when the ship might be Bernhard Schulte had said tides. be pushing back against that
nal for a fifth day Satur- dislodged. A Dutch salvage earlier that “significant prog- He told the Dutch current assessment Saturday, saying
day, as authorities made firm is attempting to refloat ress” was made late Friday at affairs show Nieuwsuur on that all possibilities, includ-
new attempts to free the the vessel with tugboats and the ship’s stern where its rud- Friday night that the front ing human and technical er-
vessel and reopen a crucial dredgers, taking advantage of der was released from sedi- of the ship is stuck in sandy rors, were being investigated.
waterway whose blockage high tides. ment. clay, but the rear “has not A prolonged closure of the
is disrupting global ship- Rabei said he remained It said around a dozen tug- been completely pushed into crucial waterway would cause
ping and trade. hopeful that dredging could boats were working Satur- the clay and that is positive delays in the global shipment
free the ship without having day alongside dredging op- because you can use the rear chain. Some 19,000 vessels
Meanwhile, the head of the to resort to removing its car- erations that were removing end to pull it free.” passed through the canal last
Suez Canal Authority said go, but added that “we are in sand and mud from around “The combination of the year, according to official fig-
strong winds were “not the a difficult situation, it’s a bad the left side of the vessel’s (tug) boats we will have ures. About 10% of world
only cause” for the Ever incident.” bow. there, more ground dredged trade flows through the ca-
Given running aground on Asked about when they ex- Some 9,000 tons of ballast away and the high tide, we nal. The closure could affect
Tuesday, appearing to push pected to free the vessel and water had been already re- hope that will be enough to oil and gas shipments to Eu-
back against conflicting as- reopen the canal, he said: “I moved from the vessel, the get the ship free somewhere rope from the Middle East.
sessments offered by others. can’t say because I do not canal chairman said. early next week,” he said. Some vessels began changing
Lt. Gen. Osama Rabei told know.” Since the blockage began, If that doesn’t work, the course and dozens of ships
a news conference Saturday Shoei Kisen, the company a maritime traffic jam had company will remove hun- were still en route to the wa-
that an investigation was on- that owns the vessel, said it grown to more than 320 ves- dreds of containers from the terway, according to the data
going but did not rule out was considering removing sels waiting on both ends of front of the ship to lighten firm Refinitiv.
human or technical error. containers if other refloating the Suez Canal and in the it, effectively lifting the ship It remained unclear how long
The massive Ever Given, a efforts failed. Great Bitter Lake in the mid- to make it easier to pull free, the blockage would last. Even
Panama-flagged ship that Two attempts to free the dle of the waterway. Berdowski said. after reopening the canal that
carries cargo between Asia vessel failed Saturday, ac- Peter Berdowski, CEO of links factories in Asia to con-
and Europe, got stuck in a cording to Bernhard Schulte Boskalis, the salvage firm A crane was already on its way sumers in Europe, the wait-
single-lane stretch of the ca- Shipmanagement, the ship’s hired to extract the Ever Giv- that can lift the containers off ing containers are likely to
nal, about six kilometers (3.7 management company, and a en said Friday said the com- the ship, he said. Bernhard arrive at busy ports, forcing
miles) north of the south- canal services provider, Leth pany hoped to pull the con- Schulte also confirmed that a them to face additional delays
ern entrance, near the city of agencies, despite hopes that tainer ship free within days Dutch and an Italian tugboat before offloading.

Police in Belarus capital arrest more than 100 protesters

(AP) — Police in the capi- government protests of 2021, term in office. Lukashenko,
tal of Belarus arrested more than 200 people were who has been characterized
more than 100 people who detained Thursday. as Europe’s last dictator, has
assembled for a protest Five journalists were among strongly repressed opposition
march Saturday to call those arrested. Four were and independent news media
for the resignation of the later released, but it was not during 26 years in power.
country’s authoritarian clear if the fifth, the editor of The post-election protests
president. the popular newspaper Na- were the largest and most
sha Niva, faced charges. persistent show of opposition
The planned event in Minsk Some journalists arrested the former Soviet republic
indicated that supporters of while covering last year’s has seen in that time, with
the political opposition seek protests were sentenced to some of them attracting as
to revive the wave of mass two years in prison. many as 200,000 people.
protests that gripped Belarus Protests broke out in Au- More than 33,000 people
for months last year but were gust after a disputed elec- were arrested during the pro-
dormant during the winter. tion that gave President Al- tests, and many of them were
During the first sizable anti- exander Lukashenko a sixth beaten by police.