Oil bunkering operations occurring near Ceuta and the Alboran Sea are worrying both experts and environmental organizations, such as the “Verdemer Ecologists in Action.”
The confederation of Spanish environmental organizations, issued a warning over these operations, which “have been forbidden by the European Union to Russia since the invasion of Ukraine.”
According to Europa Press, the organization says that oil tankers continue to bunker despite the Ministry of Transport’s General Directorate of the Merchant Marine (DGMM) having submitted a proposal to the International Maritime Organization’s (IMO) legal committee to limit transshipments of oil from Russian ships off the coast of Ceuta, bound for Asia.
“There are dozens of ships from Russia that travel the Baltic Sea, pass through the English Channel and the Strait of Gibraltar to wait for other ships and carry out the unloading,” said the confederation.
It also mentioned, according to the same media source, that the bunkering operations in question are being carried out in the exclusive economic zone (ZEE) of the Alboran Sea on occasion, as well as in the Contiguous Zone of the Territorial Sea of Morocco, “without control and on occasions with satellite monitoring turned off.”
The ecologists asserted that on April 9, three ships were coming from the ports of Ust-Luga Anch of Russia, and from Primorsk off the coast of Ceuta waiting to unload fuel.
Bunkering operations are known to be the main cause of many accidents, which is why such operations require extreme care and alertness, to avoid fire accidents or spilling fuel.
Despite being a common practice throughout the world, Ecologists in Action emphasized how dangerous bunkering is in the region they are safeguarding and endangers the Alboran Sea’s environmental system.
Ship and Bunker media said that Morocco’s Tangier Port is well positioned with a bunkering facility only 15 km away from the European Union, Algeciras, and Gibraltar.
The port’s bunkering activities have evolved massively ever since 2011, noted the same source.
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