23 crew members are stuck on the ship and most of them have exceeded their limit of 11 months to stay on board and are eligible for repatriation.
At a press briefing in Beijing today, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Wang Wenbin said that as per China’s regulations and the crew members’ quarantine requirements, China is providing convenience to these crew members.
Earlier on Monday, China had said that it has no information on reports of an Indian ship with a 23-member crew carrying Australian coal stranded off China’s coast for the past five months ago.
A union representing the sailors onboard, International Transport Workers Federation, in a statement said that it holds great concern for the sailors onboard. It said efforts to take the ship to another country or any other Chinese port has been resisted by the Chinese with the arrest of the ship and the seafarers on board.
By Anshuman Mishra