Dubai-based tanker owner Folk Shipping and mortgage holder Arab Bank have taken action in Pakistan over the alleged piracy of a chemical tanker by a caretaker in Iraq.
Abdulla Obaid, the proprietor of currently shipless Folk Shipping, told TradeWinds a long-time business associate, who had been entrusted with the repair of the 6,200-dwt Jal Doot I (built 2008), repainted it and sold it under a false name and IMO number.
“The ship was stolen from international waters after she sailed from Khor al Zubair in Iraq by our representative in Iraq,” Obaid told TradeWinds.
The vessel was Folk Shipping’s last, following a selldown of a former four-ship fleet.
TradeWinds has reported that two of the ships were sold in court auctions in 2019 and 2020. They had been arrested by National Bank of Fujairah following a dispute between Folk Shipping and oil trader Mena Energy. But Obaid told TradeWinds he planned to acquire vessels again.
When the Jal Doot I hit the beach, it was not of scrapping age, and Obaid told TradeWinds he still owed some $6m on the mortgage, far more than scrapping would bring.
“I have an offer to buy the ship for about $6m,” he added.
He named Hossain Hendas as the representative to whom he had entrusted the ship after redelivery from a charter at the end of 2020. He and Hendas had done business for years as shipowners and traders, Obaid told TradeWinds.
Contacted by telephone and asked for information about the Jal Doot I matter, Hendas told TradeWinds he did not understand English.
Folk Shipping’s Obaid told TradeWinds he understood from Hendas that the ship was undergoing a main engine repair until he learned on 28 March the vessel was on a beach in Pakistan and set for breaking by a scrap dealer called Usman Steel.
Documents provided to Pakistani authorities identified the Turkish-built, United Arab Emirates-flag Jal Doot I instead as a Chinese-built, Tanzania-flag ship called the Santiago and owned by an otherwise unknown Ontario Marine Services, and bearing an IMO number that actually belongs to a Gabon-flag tanker called Ontario, according to Obaid and records seen by TradeWinds.
Flag documents issued by Tanzania’s Zanzibar Maritime Authority and classification documents issued by an organisation called Maritime Certifications of Shipping were provided to Pakistan’s regional Balochistan Development Authority and the Balochistan Environmental Protection Agency.
Documents provided to TradeWinds show that the two government bodies revoked permission to proceed with scrapping and ordered investigations into the allegedly stolen ship.
But by the time the authorities were alerted, it was too late, Obaid said.
“I called an official of Usman Steel and gave him this information. He said, ‘It’s Friday. I’m sitting with friends. I will call you Monday’,” Obaid told TradeWinds.
But on Monday Obaid learned that the ship was on a Gadani beach with its bulbous bow already removed.
Obaid told TradeWinds both he and the bank have separate legal actions underway in Pakistani courts.
One maritime legal source told TradeWinds it is not uncommon for stolen ships to end up on a scrapping beach, sometimes but not always in case of abandonment or disputed ownership.
