The head of Sakhalin is confident that the Chinese will abandon their damaged ship with fuel oil

The governor of the Sakhalin Region, Valery Limarenko, stated that he had a "stable assumption" that the owner of the Chinese cargo ship with oil products An Yang 2, which ran aground near the port of Nevelsk, would leave it on the coast. He noted that the region faced the same problem in 2021.

"Three years ago, we had the same Chinese vessel washed ashore in the Kholmsky district, directly near the port of Kholmsky. And it was not disposed of by the Chinese owners, there was no appeal to us. We had to take the disposal completely on ourselves. <> I have a firm assumption that they will abandon the ship because it has significant damage, and I assume that its repair is impossible in the conditions in which we are now," Limarenko said in a video posted on the Telegram channel.

The governor recalled that in December 2021, the Chinese cargo ship Xing Yuan sank off the coast of Sakhalin under the flag of Sierra Leone. The Chinese owners of the bulk carrier refused to take measures to dispose of the vessel. Then the government of the Sakhalin Region took over this work. The complex of measures to remove the vessel from customs control was completed in December 2023, it was the first such practice in the Russia.

"We believe that we should not allow such a situation a second time. Therefore, we are contacting the Chinese Foreign Ministry. We appeal to the Chinese shipowner to cooperate with us. We are ready to offer all kinds of services in order to make it comfortable for the crew, and so that it would be possible to organize work on the utilization of hydrocarbons and on towing or recycling of the ship," Limarenko emphasized.

It is also reported that the chairman of the government of the Sakhalin region, Alexei Belik, reported to the governor that the shipowner's contact had already been found. Negotiations with him should take place in the near future.

"We will not wait until the storm capsizes the ship and all this remains with us on the shore. We should not wait for this. Make every effort so that the captain of the vessel comes out with constructive proposals for interaction, for example, on a boom, on exploring the vessel with the help of divers and other things," Limarenko said.

As EADaily reported, there are 20 crew members — Chinese citizens - on board the An Yang 2 cargo carrier. The press service of the regional government noted that the Chinese vessel is loaded with coal, fuel oil and engine oil.