The vessel Rhosus (“Rosus”), the cargo from which, presumably, detonated in the port of Beirut on August 4, had previously had problems with the authorities of foreign states.
According to TASS, citing data from the Spanish Ministry of Transport, in 2013, this ship flying the flag of Moldova was detained in the port of Seville for two weeks. The reason is still unknown – the agency has not received a response from the Spanish authorities to its request.
Earlier, the captain of “Rosus” said that in 2013 the ship took 2.75 thousand tons of ammonium nitrate from the Georgian Batumi for transportation to Mozambique. On the way, a call was made to Lebanon, where the ship and the crew were arrested for non-payment of the port dues by the ship owner.
According to preliminary data, the cargo of chemicals was stored in the port of Beirut for seven years and detonated on Tuesday for an unknown reason. More than 135 people became victims of the explosion, about five thousand were injured.
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