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Kurt Sansone
The next report of a Paris-based international maritime organisation is expected to drop Malta’s shipping register from the black list, putting it instead on the grey list, MaltaToday has learned.
The status of the Maltese shipping register, one of the largest in the world, is subject to a number of safety and security checks performed on vessels and depends on the number of accidents involving ships registered under the Maltese flag.
It seems that stricter controls undertaken by the Maltese authorities have reaped positive results and the Paris-based MOU is expected to grey list the Maltese ship register.
Contacted by MaltaToday Communications Minister Censu Galea would not confirm the news but said he was confident that being dropped from the black list was an achievable feat.
The Maltese ship register, often labelled in the international press as a flag of convenience, hit the spotlight in December 1999 when a single hull oil tanker, Erika broke up outside the French coast spilling tonnes of crude oil in the sea and damaging large swathes of pristine coast.
kurt@newsworksltd.com
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