Equatorial Guinea wants to put an end to illegal ships that are in its image, announced this Thursday, April 21, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, vice-president of the country and son of the head of state Nguema.
“There are over 300 ships around the world working illegally under our flag. This Wednesday, we launched a mechanism to solve and avoid this problem in the future,” he tweeted.
For him, “the flag of Equatorial Guinea cannot be the face of international fraud”. An announcement that comes after the ship Le Xelo flying the Equatoguinean flag, leaving the port of Damietta in Egypt and heading for Malta, sank on Saturday in Tunisian waters. The boat, which was carrying 750 tonnes of diesel, took shelter from the weather.
The vessel is a 58 meter long and 9 meter wide tanker. The reasons that led to its sinking are unknown for the moment, because “no leak has been detected”. However, naval forces managed to evacuate seven crew members before the boat sank completely.
Tunisia has already opened an investigation into the circumstances of the shipwreck. The crew members were questioned by the Tunisian courts and “are subject to a ban on leaving Tunisian territory”.