Floating Bombs

Labor joins MUA call for tougher restrictions on ammonium nitrate shipments

Opposition leader Kim Beazley was in Gladstone on September 1 to raise concerns over a Flag of Convenience ship carrying volatile ammonium nitrate on the Australian coast.

The Antiguan registered, Ukranian and Bulgarian crewed Pancaldo loaded 3000 tonnes of ammonium nitrate, a potential explosive, in Newcastle earlier in the week after being granted a single voyage permit to trade on the Australian coast.

"I am growing more and more concerned about the potential for foreign ships to operate in Australia's coastal waters without adequate vetting," Mr Beazley said. "I am particularly concerned about the risk posed by carriage of very dangerous substances, especially ammonium nitrate. It's becoming clearer that Australian authorities have no way of checking the bona fides of these foreign crews."

In 2004, 11,780 tonnes of ammonium nitrate was carried on the Australian coastline by foreign ships operating under permits with foreign crews. Yet a recent audit of the permit process found the checks were in shambles. (see "permit scandal")

Ammonium nitrate is widely used in agriculture and in mining - and by terrorists. When mixed with fuel oil used to power ships, it can create a bomb big enough to take out a port city. Terrorists have used it in both the Bali and the Oklahoma bombings.

"The Government says we are at risk of a terrorist attack and according to recent polls the majority of Australians agree," said MUA National Secretary Paddy Crumlin. "Yet this ship has been given the okay to trade on our coast. We've got rigorous security for the transport and storage of dangerous goods on land, but little to safeguard their passage by sea where flags of convenience, some of which are known to have been infiltrated by terrorists, are given carte blanche."

The Pancaldo has sailed from Mumbai through Singapore and Jakarta before arriving in Australia.

"Handing foreign ships and crews a potential weapon of mass destruction is madness," said Paddy Crumlin. "It seems the Government is more concerned about Australian maritime workers than they are about people coming into the country as guest workers and transporting potentially explosive cargoes on our coast."

But maritime security concerns are not restricted to carriage of volatile cargoes.

In this post 9/11 era maritime safety has been a major concern for governments.

According to a new report by the International Commission on Shipping, the current system still presents almost endless opportunities for lawlessness and terrorism.

The Icons report mark II, by former Australian transport minister Peter Morris, reviews progress in the world shipping industry since the release of its first findings in March 2001.

It notes that despite evidence that terrorist networks have infiltrated shipping, the International Shipping and Port Security Code has failed to adopt recommendations for industry access to ship and cargo ownership to "pierce the veil of secrecy."

"Obscurity of ownership presents an opportunity for terrorists, providing them with the means to operate internationally," the report notes. "As long as Governments pussyfoot on this issue, the risks and dangers remain".

What's more, while work is underway on compiling a database of manning agents and employers in five APEC economies (China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, The Philippines and Singapore) they are still free to operate outside the law.

Icons cites a plethora of unregulated, unaudited and unaccountable providers of marine labour who are not subject to the same scrutiny as seafarers.

"Who are they? What is the money flow? Who pays whom for jobs? Who sets labour rates?"

Instead, seafarers have been made the scapegoats, with the real villains - the corporate criminals, still lurking behind flags of convenience. The march offshore to avoid tax, labour, safety and security laws continues with seafarers becoming scapegoats victimised because of race, religion and culture.

The full report can be downloaded from the website.