BIMCO asks that all high seas regulation to be UN controlled

THE Baltic and International Maritime Council (BIMCO), whose shipowners run 65 per cent of global shipping, wants the UN's International Maritime Organisation (IMO) to control all high seas regulation and "govern shipping's response to greenhouse gas emissions".

BIMCO, representing the big companies, wants the United Nations body to end rights of national sovereignty and be the "only viable vehicle for regulation of a global industry".

"Central is the need to keep regulation global, and control the forces of unilateralism, regionalism and the tendency to make local laws, which threaten to make the operation of internationally trading ships chaotic," said the BIMCO statement said.

"The plague of piracy has become the most serious security challenge despite the efforts of naval forces and best management practices aboard merchant vessels.

"BIMCO, which has launched its Automated Voyage Risk Assessment Service to help owners gauge all security risks, lobbies hard for more effective defences, a government based solution to the security situation ashore in Somalia and an effective legal regime to prosecute pirates," the BIMCO statement said.

(Source: www.schednet.com)