Shipowner in Baltimore bridge collapse seeks to limit its liability - The Straits Times

Wreckage of the Francis Scott Key bridge lies across the deck of the Dali cargo vessel, as salvage work continues in Baltimore on April 1. PHOTO: REUTERS

BALTIMORE – The owner of the ship that rammed into a bridge in Baltimore last week, killing six workers and throwing the eastern US transportation network into chaos, is seeking to limit its liability to about US$43.7 million (S$59 million).

The company, Grace Ocean, could face hundreds of millions of dollars in damage claims, legal experts say. On April 1, it filed a petition jointly with Synergy Marine, which was operating the Singapore-flagged cargo ship Dali. They claim the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge was “not due to any fault, neglect, or want of care” of the companies and that they should not be held liable for any loss or damage from the disaster.

But if they are held liable, it should not be for more than the current value of the ship and its cargo, the companies said. Following the crash, the total value has fallen from as much as US$90 million to US$43,670,000, according to the filing in federal court in Maryland.

The petition, filed less than a week after the March 26 crash and as parts of the ship remain stuck at the site of the accident, is a common move for shipowners in the wake of catastrophic crashes. It invokes a 19th-century law once used by the Titanic’s owner to reduce the shipowner’s liability after a crash to the value of the ship and any pending freight.

The companies said they expect the liability limit they are seeking to be “substantially less than the amount that has been or will be claimed” in losses or damages. They also want any lawsuits filed against them as a result of the bridge collapse to be litigated in the Maryland federal court where the companies filed their petition. 

The law that would enable Grace Ocean to curb its liability was also used by the owner of a dive boat that caught fire off the coast of southern California in 2019 and killed 34 people. In that case, boat owner Truth Aquatics filed its petition to a California federal court three days after the fatal voyage took place.

Families of the victims filed wrongful death claims for an unspecified amount in damages. That litigation has yet to be resolved more than four years later, a possible indication of a long legal fight for Grace Ocean and Synergy. 

To overcome the liability limit, anyone seeking to recover funds from owners of the Dali would likely have to show that the ship was not seaworthy due to issues such as an incompetent crew or mechanical issues, said Mr Steven Yerrid, a lawyer who represented the pilot of the vessel that struck the Sunshine Skyway Bridge in Tampa, Florida, in 1980, killing 35 people.

“It’s an entitlement that’s allowed, it’s not a guarantee,” he said. “A shipowner that’s found to have an unseaworthy vessel, they lose the entitlement to limit the fund recovered by injured people or dead people or people who have the status to sue. The limitation fund is for those who sail seaworthy vessels with competent crews. If that’s not found, they don’t get that limitation.” BLOOMBERG

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2024-04-01 23:40:00Z
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New Indonesia leader visits China, promises close ties - CNA

Prabowo's decision to visit China ahead of Indonesia's neighbours in the region underlines the close partnership built up in the past decade under Jokowi when China became Indonesia's top trading partner, supplying natural resources including nickel and coal.

Jokowi's first visit after his inauguration was to China, for an annual summit of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders in 2014. That was followed by six more visits.

China has also ploughed billions into Indonesian infrastructure and industrial projects, including the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed railway.

It remains to be seen how Prabowo, now Indonesia's defence minister, will navigate issues including the jostling for influence between China and the United States in Southeast Asia.

Prabowo has previously said Indonesia was committed to its policy of non-alignment and would keep good ties with both China and the United States.

China's expansive claims in the South China Sea may present a test for his leadership, although the two countries' overlapping claims there have not become a vociferous dispute as has unfolded in recent months between China and the Philippines.

Indonesia says the southern end of the South China Sea is part of its exclusive economic zone. China says the area is within its own territorial claim, marked by a U-shaped "nine-dash line" rejected by other regional states.

China is willing to continue to deepen maritime cooperation with Indonesia, Xi told Prabowo on Monday.

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2024-04-01 13:50:00Z
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Indonesian president-elect visits China after decade of close ties - CNA

BEIJING: Indonesia's president-elect Prabowo Subianto is expected to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Monday (Apr 1) for high-level talks, less than two months after winning the race to lead Southeast Asia's biggest economy.

Prabowo is visiting at Xi's invitation to discuss two-way ties, even though the 72-year-old political veteran will only be sworn in as the next leader of Southeast Asia's most populous nation in October.

China becomes the first foreign nation Prabowo has visited as president-elect, ahead of Indonesia's neighbours in the region, underlining the close partnership built up in the past decade under his predecessor, Joko Widodo.

In contrast, Jokowi, as the incumbent Indonesian leader is also known, did not travel abroad as president-elect before being sworn in.

But Jokowi's first visit after his inauguration was to China, for an annual summit of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders in 2014. That was followed by six more through 2023.

China has become Indonesia's top trading partner during the last decade, as its natural resources such as coal and nickel help to power the world's second-largest economy.

China has also ploughed billions into Indonesian infrastructure and industrial projects, including the Jakarta-Bandung high-speed railway.

Prabowo will also visit Japan on Apr 2 to 3, where he is set to meet Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and other officials, Japan's chief Cabinet secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi said on Monday.

Japan and Indonesia are comprehensive strategic partners sharing fundamental principles and values, and it is hoped Prabowo's visit will bolster close bilateral cooperation in a wide range of areas, Hayashi told a regular press conference.

In 2021, Prabowo and Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi signed a deal to facilitate defence equipment transfers in a meeting with their Japanese counterparts, as Japan seeks to expand military and economic cooperation with Southeast Asian nations to counter China.

Japan and Indonesia in December reached another deal to remove more trade barriers.

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2024-04-01 08:44:00Z
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Political Islam: Syariah-inspired laws in some parts of Malaysia, Indonesia worry non-Muslims - CNA

KUALA LUMPUR/PADANG: Ms Hasyimah Ayuni has only recently taken an interest in Islam outside the mosque.

The youngest of seven siblings, Ms Hasyimah, who is pursuing a masters degree in environmental health at a university in Malaysia’s Klang Valley, now believes that it is her duty to live in accordance with Islamic principles. 

This came about following a court case that challenged the validity of several Syariah laws in the eastern state of Kelantan in February.    

Ms Hasyimah told CNA that as Malaysia has a Muslim majority, it was logical that laws for Muslims be given priority over other laws.

She also wants Malaysia to use Syariah laws instead of the common law system being used today.  

“As a Muslim, you have laws in your religion that God told you to follow but your country asks you to follow (their) laws, some which are based on Western sources (and) differ from your religion. Wouldn’t you feel angry and sad?” she said, adding that Islam covers all aspects of life. 

She believes Syariah laws are the best set of laws that would guarantee the wellbeing of both Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

“This is because the laws are based on legal sources for Muslims such as the Quran (Islam’s holy book),” she said. 

According to a study by the Pew Research Center in 2022, most Muslims in both Malaysia and neighbouring Indonesia favoured making Syariah the official law of the land. 

The results of the study, which were released in September last year, said that 86 per cent of Malaysian Muslims supported using Syariah as the official law of the land, while 64 per cent of Indonesian Muslims supported the idea.  

But communities in the two countries are debating whether these regulations should apply to all, or if Islam’s influence could impact diversity and social freedoms. 

According to the Pew Research Center, Syariah, or Islamic law, offers moral and legal guidance for nearly all aspects of life – from marriage and divorce, to inheritance and contracts, to criminal punishments. 

About 63.5 per cent of Malaysians are Muslims, according to official statistics.

Political analyst Azmi Hassan of the Nusantara Strategic Academy said most Muslims in Malaysia would say that Syariah law should be used to govern them, and this was regardless of where they come from or their status. 

“The belief is there in general. Syariah laws are considered to be the ultimate in governance and Muslims believe them to be the best laws compared to whatever other laws that are being practised,” he said.

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2024-03-31 22:00:00Z
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Israeli 'spy' nabbed in KL reportedly seeking revenge on countryman after Tel Aviv grenade attack - The Straits Times

The Israeli man caught in Kuala Lumpur on March 27 told police that he came to Malaysia to assassinate a fellow Israeli over a family dispute. ST PHOTO: KEVIN LIM

PETALING JAYA - The assassination target of an Israeli man arrested by Malaysian police on March 27 had been nabbed for murder nearly two decades ago.

According to news portal Times of Israel, Eran Haya came to Malaysia following grenade attacks on the house of the recently detained Israeli man, identified as Shalom Avitan, in Tel Aviv earlier in March.

According to another Israeli news portal, Haaretz, Haya was arrested for a murder in Mexico in 2004 when he was 23.

Haya was suspected of killing a policeman-turned-gangland assassin in Cancun, Mexico, in December 2004, reported The Jerusalem Post.

Haya, who was an American citizen, had been under police surveillance until he went back to Israel two years later.

According to police sources, Haya, who grew up in the United States, returned to Israel at age 16 with his father, at which point he became active in the Israeli criminal underworld.

He was also a suspect in a number of other mob hits and murder attempts, although police sources say they have had trouble finding evidence against him.

He was believed to have ties to the Parinyan and Mulner crime syndicates.

One of these families was said to be in a violent feud with the Musli brothers crime family.

Avitan was caught at a five-star hotel in Kuala Lumpur on March 27. He allegedly came to Malaysia using a French passport but handed over an Israeli passport following police interrogation.

He told police that he came to Malaysia to assassinate a fellow Israeli over a family dispute.

However, police have not ruled out the possibility that Avitan is a foreign intelligence agent and have heightened security at places of interest and for the Malaysian King, Sultan Ibrahim Iskandar, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and other dignitaries. THE STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK

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• Israel
• Criminal investigations

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2024-03-31 10:19:00Z
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Salvage crews to lift first piece of collapsed Baltimore bridge - CNA

"This is a remarkably complex operation," Moore said of the effort to clear bridge debris and open the Port of Baltimore to shipping traffic.

The bodies of two workers who were repairing the bridge deck at the time of the disaster have been recovered, but Moore said efforts to recover four others presumed dead remain suspended because conditions are too dangerous for divers to work amid too much debris.

Coast Guard Rear Admiral Shannon Gilreath told reporters that teams from the Coast Guard, the US Navy's salvage arm and the US Army Corps of Engineers said the debris from the Patapsco River's deep-draft shipping channel would have to be removed before the Dali could be moved.

Saturday's operation involves cutting a piece just north of that channel and lifting it with a 160-ton marine crane onto a barge. A larger, 1,000-ton crane also is at the bridge site.

The piece will be brought to Tradepoint Atlantic, the site of the former Bethlehem Steel Mill which is being developed into a distribution center for companies including Amazon.com, Home Depot and Volkswagen. The facility's port, which sits on the Chesapeake Bay side of the collapsed bridge, is fully operational.

Five days after the tragedy, the jobs of some 15,000 people whose work revolves around daily port operation are on hold. While logistics experts say that other East Coast ports should be able to handle container traffic, Baltimore is the largest US port for "roll-on, roll-off" vehicle imports and exports of farm and construction equipment.

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2024-03-30 20:53:00Z
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Japan, China experts discuss Fukushima water release - CNA

TOKYO: Japanese and Chinese experts held talks on treated wastewater from the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant, Japan's foreign ministry said late Saturday (Mar 30), the first such talks to be announced since Tokyo began releasing the water into the ocean last year.

Japan and China have been at loggerheads over the discharge of the wastewater, which was used to cool the reactors after the 2011 meltdown.

Japan insists it has been safely treated, but China has criticised the release and banned Japanese seafood imports.

"A dialogue between Japanese and Chinese experts on the discharge of ... treated water into the ocean (by the Fukushima plant) was held in Dalian, China on Mar 30 to exchange views on technical matters," Tokyo's foreign ministry said in a statement.

The announcement comes after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in November and said science-based discussions would take place at the expert level.

Japan began gradually discharging some of the 1.34 million tonnes of wastewater that have accumulated since the disaster into the Pacific in August, sparking a diplomatic row with China and Russia, both of which banned seafood imports.

China has accused Tokyo of treating the sea as a "sewer", but Japan insists the discharge is safe, a view backed by the UN atomic agency.

Kishida called on China at the November Asia-Pacific summit in San Francisco to make an "objective judgment" on the safety of Japan's seafood, which is a major industry in the country.

Japan began releasing the treated wastewater because the nuclear facility was running out of space to build more water tanks, and it needed to make room for the much more hazardous task of removing radioactive fuel and rubble from the three stricken reactors.

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