Maritime Law & Regulations News

A Tanzanian national has appeared in the Port Adelaide Magistrate's Court in Australia charged with the alleged importation of 3kg of methamphetamine into Australia.An investigation started on November 8 after a security officer contracted by Flinders Ports at Port Adelaide stopped the cargo ship crew member, 50, for a random baggage inspection as he left for shore leave.Three suspicious packages containing a crystal-like substance were found in a backpack the man was carrying.

The U.S. military killed three men in a strike on a suspected drug vessel in international waters in the Caribbean on Thursday, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said.Hegseth, said in a post on social media website X that the vessel was operated by a "Designated Terrorist Organization" but provided no further evidence. His post included a 20-second video clip, marked unclassified, of a boat in the water that gets struck by a munition and explodes.The military action was the latest of more than a dozen U.S.

A Greek prosecutor has extended charges to four more senior coast guard officers over one of the Mediterranean's deadliest accidents, a 2023 shipwreck in which hundreds drowned off the southwestern town of Pylos, legal sources said on Thursday.The charges follow an appeal by lawyers representing the victims, the sources told Reuters.The shipwreck of the overloaded migrant boat Adriana in international waters on June 14, 2023, sent shockwaves across Europe. A Greek naval court…

CMA CGM has reversed a decision to suspend cargo shipments to Mali over safety concerns and a fuel shortage, the French group said on Thursday following a meeting with the authorities.In early September, al Qaeda-linked militant group Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) announced a blockade on fuel imports to the landlocked West African country. The group has since attacked convoys of fuel tankers attempting to enter the country or reach the capital, Bamako."Overland transport has been heavily impacted in terms of both transit times and costs…

Maritime intelligence company Pole Star Global has launched three new products — Meridia, Meridia IQ, and Insights Data Products — forming a unified ecosystem that integrates maritime analytics, generative AI, and data delivery.Together, these solutions empower shipping companies, governments, and financial institutions to act on trusted intelligence in real time — improving safety, compliance, and operational performance across global maritime domains, says Pole Star Global.Meridia: A maritime analytics platform that consolidates port, zone, and vessel analytics into one environment.

The International Labour Organization (ILO) has adopted Guidelines for Fair Labour Market Services for Migrant Fishers at a meeting convened in Geneva from October 27 to 31.Guidance on recruitment processes, work agreements, complaint procedures, and enforcement measures is included to safeguard the rights of migrant fishers globally while also supporting employers in recruiting and retaining a skilled workforce.The guidance comes as the fishing industry continues to face human rights violations and inadequate regulatory oversight.

The CEO of Austrian energy firm OMV on Tuesday urged the European Union to reconsider its sustainability legislation or risk losing Qatar as a gas supplier which would undermine prosperity in the region.Qatar's Energy Minister Saad al-Kaabi, who is also CEO of QatarEnergy said on Monday that he could halt business with the EU if it does not significantly ease its Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive.Kaabi told Reuters at the ADIPEC energy conference in Abu Dhabi that Qatar has contingency plans in place should it decide to stop shipments to Europe in response to the directive - a t

Egypt's Suez Canal revenues rose 14.2% year-on-year between July and October, the canal authority said on Tuesday, citing calmer conditions in the Red Sea after a ceasefire in Gaza and a pick up in traffic through the vital waterway.Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis launched more than 100 attacks on ships in the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden and the Bab al-Mandab Strait that links them in 2023 and 2024 in what they described as solidarity with the Palestinians over Israel's war in Gaza…

The European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) led a large-scale joint customs operation, NOXIA II, successfully targeting shipments suspected of containing illicit cigarettes, waste, drug precursors, and pesticides.The operation led to the coordinated seizure by the participating customs authorities of 149.5 million cigarettes, over 3,000 tonnes of illicit waste, 66.5 kg of pseudoephedrine, 52 tonnes of solid pesticides, and 21,000 liters of liquid pesticides.NOXIA II revealed the use of sophisticated global routes to smuggle cigarettes into the Asia-Pacific region and Europe.

A sanctioned liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanker made a ship-to-ship (STS) transfer off the coast of Malaysia after picking up a cargo from a Russian export terminal also under Western restrictions, according to two analytics firms.The operation appears to be the first known STS transfer of sanctioned Russian LNG, despite Western efforts to curb Moscow's energy revenues over its war in Ukraine.The LNG tanker Perle, which was sanctioned by the United States in January, had been…

VIKING Life-Saving Equipment, a maritime safety solutions specialist and supplier of high-performance boats, has signed a contract with the Norwegian Customs Service (Tolletaten) to deliver a new fleet of cutting-edge patrol and fast response craft.The new boats will strengthen Tolletaten’s maritime capabilities and support its law enforcement and inspection duties in Norwegian waters.The agreement covers the delivery of four VIKING Norsafe boats including one Marathon S-900, powered by twin 350 HP Mercury engines…

On the afternoon of March 8, a petroleum tanker named Torm Agnes entered the Port of Ensenada on Mexico’s Pacific coast carrying almost 120,000 barrels of diesel.Such a vessel was a rare sight in that port, which mainly hosts cruise liners, luxury yachts and container ships. Ensenada lacks the infrastructure needed to unload cargos of flammable hydrocarbons safely – making what happened later that day odder still.Waves of fuel-hauling trucks rolled up to the dock to cart away much of the Torm Agnes’ load.

Italy's antitrust regulator said on Friday that Shipping Agencies Services (SAS), a unit of maritime group MSC, would drop its acquisition of a 49% stake in ferry operator Moby after the watchdog opened a probe into alleged restriction of competition.Moby, majority-owned by Onorato Armatori group, runs ferries linking Italy's mainland to tourist islands such as Sardinia and Corsica.The Italian authority, which opened an investigation into the acquisition last year, said the deal could have weakened competition on routes where Moby and ferry company Grandi Navi Veloci (GNV), controlled by SAS,

Italy's antitrust regulator said on Friday that Shipping Agencies Services (SAS), a unit of maritime group MSC, would drop its acquisition of a 49% stake in ferry operator Moby after the watchdog opened a probe into alleged restriction of competition.Moby, majority-owned by Onorato Armatori group, runs ferries linking Italy's mainland to tourist islands such as Sardinia and Corsica.The Italian authority, which opened an investigation into the acquisition last year, said the deal could have weakened competition on routes where Moby and ferry company Grandi Navi Veloci (GNV), controlled by SAS, operate.Under the commitments offered by SAS and Moby, SAS will transfer to Onorato Armatori its 49% stake in Moby without consideration, the watchdog said in a statement.Moby will mandate an independ

The Pakistan navy said on Wednesday it seized narcotics worth about $972 million in the North Arabian Sea in an operation with a Saudi-led task force.The navy's YARMOOK ship, operating under the Saudi-led Combined Task Force of the Combined Maritime Forces, carried out the operation, the navy said in a statement.(Reuters - Reporting by Asif Shahzad)

The U.S. military killed five alleged drug smugglers in strikes against two vessels in the eastern Pacific Ocean, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Wednesday, in an expansion of the Trump administration's use of the armed forces in its counter-narcotics campaign.On Wednesday afternoon, Hegseth said the military attacked a vessel in the eastern Pacific Ocean and killed two men on Tuesday. It was the first known U.S. military operation in the Pacific since President Donald Trump kicked off a new offensive against the drug trade.Hours later…

Three men who sank a drug-filled luxury sports cruiser in the waters off Western Australia in 2023 have been sentenced to a combined 29 years and six months' imprisonment for their roles in a botched plot to import more than 300kg of cocaine into the state.The men, aged 38, 47 and 51, each pleaded guilty to one count of importing a commercial quantity of a border controlled drug, contrary to section 307.1 of the Criminal Code (Cth). The 38-year-old was sentenced to nine years and three months' imprisonment with a non-parole period of six years.

A newly released study by Seafarers' Rights International (SRI) finds that cabotage laws now exist on 85% of the world’s coastlines, are growing in number at an unprecedented pace, and are increasingly essential to national security, economic stability and maritime resilience.The Cabotage Laws of the World (2025) report, commissioned by the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF), compares nations in their enforcement of cabotage laws, which restrict the waterborne transportation of goods or passengers between two points within the same country to domestic carriers.

Singapore’s Seatrium has received a notice of arbitration from Maersk Offshore Wind’s affiliate, regarding the dispute over the termination of a $475 million contract for a nearly completed wind turbine installation vessel (WTIV) originally intended for Equinor’s Empire Wind 1 project in the United States.The arbitration notice, received on October 21, comes just one day after Seatrium Energy (International) (SEI), a subsidiary of Seatrium, informed the buyer that the vessel would be ready for delivery by January 30…

Growing environmental pressures are reviving interest in nuclear propulsion as a potential long-term route to decarbonize shipping, DNV said in a new paper, despite there being no civilian nuclear-powered vessels built for more than four decades.DNV’s latest report, Maritime nuclear propulsion: Technologies, commercial viability, and regulatory challenges for nuclear-powered vessels, highlights how maritime nuclear technologies differ from land-based reactors, and emphasizes the need to address technological…

Lloyd’s Register (LR) has entered into strategic collaboration with Greece-based DYNAMARINe to launch an independent auditing program aimed at improving the safety, transparency and performance of ship-to-ship (STS) transfer operations worldwide.Under the new framework, LR’s auditors will assess STS service providers in line with standards set by the Oil Companies International Marine Forum (OCIMF) guidelines, while also reviewing risk data and operational records compiled by DYNAMARINe.

U.S. forces attacked a vessel associated with a Colombian leftist rebel group, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Sunday, the same day President Donald Trump called Colombian President Gustavo Petro an "illegal drug leader" and said payments to the South American nation would cease.Trump's comments marked a new low in relations between Bogota and Washington, which have frayed since Trump returned to office in January and since his administration launched a series of strikes…

China's sanctions on U.S.-linked units of shipbuilder Hanwha Ocean threaten to impact ambitious plans for shipbuilding cooperation between Seoul and Washington by disrupting supplies of Chinese equipment and materials, officials in Seoul said on Friday.Beijing announced the sanctions on Tuesday as the U.S. and China began charging additional port fees on each other's vessels, in the latest exchange in a protracted trade war ahead of a planned meeting of the two countries' leaders.South…

Britain targeted Russia's two largest oil companies, Lukoil and Rosneft, and 44 shadow fleet tankers on Wednesday in what it described as a new bid to tighten energy sanctions and choke off Kremlin revenues.Lukoil and Rosneft were designated under Britain's Russia sanctions laws for what London described as their role in supporting the Russian government. They are subject to an asset freeze, director disqualification, transport restrictions, and a ban on British trust services.The two companies were considered strategically significant to the Kremlin…