Spain's Supreme Court has handed down its final ruling on the huge amount of compensation owed to the state and others for the Prestige tanker disaster in 2002.
It ordered on Thursday that Spain be paid EUR 1.5bn ($1.7bn) in damages, AFP reported.
The 1976-built tanker broke in two and sank off Galicia while it was being towed away from the coast, spilling more than 50,000 tonnes of crude that reached beaches - the Iberian peninsula's worst environmental disaster.
The decision followed an earlier ruling in the northwestern city of La Coruna which said the regional government of Galicia, off whose coast the Prestige tanker broke in two, be compensated with EUR 1.8bn.
Neighbouring France, which was also affected, was awarded EUR 61m last year.
The court said the final ruling on civil liability "fixes compensation at above EUR 1.5bn" to be paid by the vessel's captain Apostolos Mangouras and the London Steam-Ship Owners' Mutual Insurance Association (London Club).
The previous ruling limited their payment to $1bn, with the rest having to come from the owner, Mare Shipping, and the International Oil Pollution Compensation Funds (IOPC Funds).
Clarification sought
The London Club said last year it was aware of the Spanish judgement and added it remained "concerned at the direction that the Spanish Court has taken generally, including in respect of the international CLC Convention."
"The London Club look forward to clarification of and the opportunity to study the findings in more detail before making further comment," it said at the time.
Damage from the spill has been estimated at EUR 4.3bn.
TradeWinds has reported there was a EUR 22.8m limit of liability under the 1992 Civil Liability Convention (CLC).
But Spain's threat to press ahead with a demand for $1bn compensation from the London Club led to a call for consistency in the way international conventions are applied.
The International Group (IG), the organisation linking the 13 leading protection-and-indemnity (P&I) clubs, is joining forces with the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) to press for more uniformity in turning conventions into national laws and subsequent legal interpretations.
