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Zagreb - The parliamentary groups of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) and the opposition Homeland Movement (DP) said on Monday that Croatia should ratify the international convention for the safe recycling of ships and the agreement on the safety of fishing vessels.
"The safety of people navigating the Adriatic and the seas of the world has no alternative," DP MP Davor Dretar said, calling for the ratification of the 2012 Cape Town Agreement on fishing vessel safety.
Josip Bilaver, State Secretary at the Ministry of the Sea, said that the agreement includes mandatory safety measures for vessels 24 metres in length or longer fishing the high seas, with provisions on stability, seaworthiness, machinery and electrical installations, and life-saving appliances.
Before entering into force, the agreement must be ratified by 22 countries, which together have a total of 3,600 fishing vessels, and so far it has been adopted by 14 countries.
The two political parties also endorsed a proposal to ratify the Hong Kong International Convention for the Safe and Environmentally Sound Recycling of Ships.
The convention lays down the conditions that must be met by ship recycling yards, HDZ MP Branko Bačić said, adding that the steel that ships are made of will not end up as waste but will be used as raw material for new products.
The convention does not apply to warships, vessels below 500 gross tonnes, and ships operating only in waters subject to the sovereignty or jurisdiction of the state whose flag they fly.
Bačić said it was important that maritime transport was safe and ships were of good quality. He said that the average age of ships with a carrying capacity of 500 tonnes and more was about 21 years. He noted that in 2018 alone there had been over a thousand accidents at sea in the world in which 46 vessels had sunk.