Widow of Bangladeshi ship-breaking worker absolve to sue UK-based firm
A Bangladeshi woman whose husband died while dismantling an oil tanker at a ship-breaking yard in 2018 can file a negligence claim against a British company mixed up in vessel's sale, London's High Court ruled this week, reports Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Khalil Mollah, 32, fell to his death while focusing on a tanker called the EKTA in the port city of Chattogram in southeastern Bangladesh, where scores of end-of-life ships are sent to be scrapped each year.
British legal representatives representing his widow, Hamida Begum, took her case to court in April 2019, arguing that Maran (UK) Ltd was accountable for the ship finding yourself in Bangladesh, where working conditions in ship-breaking yards were regarded as dangerous.
Maran had not been immediately available to comment on Monday's High Court judgement, which said Begum had "a genuine prospect of succeeding with regards to her claim in negligence".
"The proximate reason behind the accident was the deceased's fall from a height, but on a broader, purposive approach the accident resulted from a chain of events which resulted in the vessel being grounded at Chattogram," the court's judgement read.
The ruling denied a credit card applicatoin filed by Maran earlier this season to have Begum's claim struck out.
The EKTA, that was formerly called the Maran Centaurus, had been owned and managed by companies belonging to the Angelicoussis Shipping Group, including Maran (UK) Limited, according to details from the judgement.
Rather than deal directly with ship-breakers it has been standard practice for decades for ship-owners to do something through brokers or intermediaries, the ruling said.
The Maran Centaurus was sold for demolition within an August 2017 deal worth a lot more than $16 million.
Bangladesh is one of the most popular destinations for breaking end-of-life ships with at least 230 ships out around 670 broken on its beaches this past year, according to NGO Shipbreaking Platform.
Thousands of Bangladeshis be based upon the sector for survival, but rights groups have been sounding the alarm about hazardous working conditions in the market for years.
At least 24 ship-breaking personnel were killed this past year and another 34 were seriously injured at the scrap yards, the best toll in almost ten years, according to Bangladeshi non-profit Young Power in Social Action.
Most companies sell ships to scrap dealers, better referred to as cash buyers, who pay the best price for ships and so are closely associated with beach yards where unsafe working practices are normal, Shipbreaking Platform said in a recent report.
Oliver Holland, somebody at the Leigh Day lawyer representing Begum, said that trend could change if Maran (UK) was created to accept that it owed Begum's husband a duty of care.
"Maybe which will go some way to making UK shipping companies think about accepting greater financial reward because of their end-of-life vessels at the price tag on the surroundings and the lives of South Asian workers," he said.
