The world's largest factory fishing ship, the Damanzaihao, is leaving Peru after a month-long detention.
The vessel, which has the capacity to harvest and process up to 547,000 metric tons of fish annually, had been detained in the Peruvian port of Chimbote by the Peruvian Environmental Prosecutor’s Office after the vessel was accused of illegal fishing practices and marine pollution.
Previously owned by Sustainable Fishing Resources SAC, a subsidiary of the China Fishery Group, the Damanzaihao was sold in April 2018 to DVS-R, a Singapore-based firm controlled by the Russian fishing tycoon Dmitrii Dremliuga, for USD 11.2 million (EUR 9.6 million).
Two separate decisions in June by Peruvian courts nullified the arrest of the ship and cleared its current owner to take control of it, according to El Comercio. Upon receipt of the vessel, DVS-R planned to take the ship to the port city of La Libertad, in Ecuador, the newspaper reported.
The Damanzaihao’s former owner, Sustainable Fishing Resources SAC, is currently in the process of settling a dispute with the government of Peru over PEN 23 million (USD 7 million, EUR 6 million) in fines issued in 2016 for illegal fishing activities and for dumping solid and liquid waste into Chimbote Bay. According to El Comercio, the Damanzaihao was released after Sustainable Fishing Resources SAC signed a letter guaranteeing it would pay a reduced fine of PEN 5.8 million (USD 1.8 million, EUR 1.5 million) in case of an unfavorable ruling by the Supreme Court of Peru.
The Belize-flagged vessel remains on a blacklist maintained by the South Pacific Regional Management Organization’s blacklist after it was caught fishing in the region without authorization, according to El Comercio.
