Saudi Arabia welcomes transfer of oil from Yemen’s decaying FSO Safer tanker

Saudi Arabia welcomed on Wednesday the beginning of a process to transfer over one million barrels of oil from a decaying tanker off Yemen’s coast as per a United Nations plan.
The Kingdom also welcomed international efforts that allowed this issue to be resolved, while expressing its appreciation for the work done by the UN team and chief, Antonio Guterres, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
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The UN announced on Tuesday that it had begun transferring the oil from the tanker in an attempt to avert a catastrophic oil spill.
The transfer of 1.14 million barrels of Marib light crude from the 47-year-old FSO Safer to a new vessel is expected to take around three weeks.
The UN hopes the $143 million operation will eliminate the risk of an environmental disaster that it estimates would cost $20 billion to clean up.
Because of the Safer’s position in the Red Sea, a spill would also cost billions of dollars per day in shipping disruptions through the Bab al-Mandab Strait to the Suez Canal, while devastating coastal fishing communities, ecosystems and lifeline ports.
The Safer, a floating storage and offloading facility, has been moored around 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the port of Hodeida since the 1980s.
It has not been serviced since the Yemen war broke out eight years ago.
The Saudi Foreign Ministry added in the statement that the Kingdom thanked donor states for their financial contributions to help end the threat caused by the decaying oil tanker.
The Kingdom was among first donor countries to donate through the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center (KSrelief) to help resolve the issue.

With AFP
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