The Sunny Liger, a ship with a cargo of Russian oil, is still anchored at the IJmuiden Sea Lock on Sunday morning because the port of Amsterdam does not want to unload the cargo. This informs FNV Havens director Niek Stam to NRC† The ship sails under the flag of the Marshall Islands, but originates from the Russian port of Primorsk. Sunny Liger has been fixed since the night of Friday to Saturday.
Initially, the Sunny Liger intended to unload the cargo in a port in Sweden, but it was refused there, after which it reserved a place in a Rotterdam terminal. The Ukrainian embassy in the Netherlands then called on the cabinet to keep the ship from the port of Rotterdam. But because the ship does not sail under the Russian flag, it is not subject to EU sanctions against Russia. According to Minister Wopke Hoekstra (Foreign Affairs, CDA), the cabinet cannot therefore intervene.
‘VOC mentality’
On Friday morning, Sunny Liger first disappeared from the registration system of the port of Rotterdam, after which it reappeared a few hours later, inspectors informed FNV director Stam. In the course of Friday evening it became clear that the ship was on its way to the port of Amsterdam. There, port employees refused to unload the cargo of Russian oil. Since then, Sunny Liger has been anchored in IJmuiden.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is still trying to find out which tank owner in the port of Rotterdam had approved the reservation of Sunny Liger on Friday. According to Stam, that person has a “VOC mentality”: “it is war so there is money to be made”. “We think it is contaminated work to unload Russian oil, which was not even intended for a Dutch company.”
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