A Lebanese prosecutor on Saturday ordered the seizure of a Syrian-flagged ship that docked at a port in the country’s north with a shipment of “stolen” Ukrainian grain, according to Kyiv’s embassy in Beirut.
Ukrainian authorities regularly accuse Russia of stealing Ukraine’s crops in the areas it occupies, for domestic consumption or for illegal sale abroad.
In Beirut, prosecutor Ghassan Oueidat has instructed the police to investigate the case of the ship “Laodicea” anchored in the port of Tripoli in northern Lebanon, a judicial official said.
boat seizure
The prosecutor ordered the “seizure of the boat until the end of the investigation,” added this official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Ukraine’s ambassador to Lebanon, Ihor Ostash, announced Thursday that he had met with Lebanese President Michel Aoun and discussed “the entry of a Syrian ship (…) loaded with barley, illegally, from the occupied Ukrainian territories.” .
On Friday, Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib announced on his Twitter account that he had received “a series of protests and warnings from various Western countries following the arrival of a Syrian-flagged ship loaded with flour and barley.”
The property belongs to a Syrian
According to initial information, the director of the charter company is Turkish, while the merchandise belongs to a Syrian trader, the justice official said, adding that part of the cargo must be unloaded in Lebanon and the rest in Syria.
A customs official said on Friday that after verification, “the documents of the goods were in order and there was no evidence that they had arrived in Lebanon stolen.”
The incident comes in a country in the midst of economic collapse and suffering from a shortage of wheat. Lebanese are lining up for bags of subsidized bread, as the country imports 80% of its wheat from Ukraine.
Source: BFM TV
