The Cook Islands ship register has hit back after the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) criticised its safety and seafarer welfare record.
The country was named by the union among the four worst flags operating in the Mediterranean, alongside Sierra Leone, Togo and Palau.
The ITF said it was launching a campaign of inspections that would target up to 1,000 vessels registered with the four flag states.
Maritime Cook Islands (MCI) told TradeWinds that in recent years it has enhanced its capacity as a registry, improving its standing in the various port state control regions.
It has been on the Paris MOU’s grey list for three years.
Between 2020 and 2022, Cook Islands ships were inspected 122 times in the Paris MOU region.
A total of 11 detentions resulted, with 536 deficiencies found.
For the same period, Cook Islands vessels were inspected 102 times in the Mediterranean MOU, with two detentions as a result, which MCI said corresponds to a white flag standard of performance.
The register recently passed a mandatory International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification & Watchkeeping for Seafarers audit and the country has signed up to the Maritime Labour Convention (MLC).
Resolved complaints
“Over the last few years, the flag has processed and resolved several MLC complaints, cooperating with both crew and managers and liaising with other interested stakeholders, in order to ensure the repatriation of seafarers as well as the payment of due wages,” MCI said.
Abandonment cases on Cook Islands vessels have decreased, with two cases in 2021, one case in 2022 and none in 2023, it claimed.
“MCI and the Cook Islands will continue working to improve its legislation, procedures and systems in order to continuously enhance the standards implemented on board its registered vessels so as to guarantee the well-being of seafarers and to ensure that shipping operations are safe, secure and environmentally friendly,” the registry added.
MCI said it has never been approached by the ITF.
In February 2021, TradeWinds reported that Dubai-based Prime Tankers had not paid an inadequately provisioned crew on one of its vessels for two months at the time a seafarer took his own life in January, according to the ITF.
Questions arose about whether the 4,600-dwt Sea Princess (built 1993) was under any flag state’s legal jurisdiction and what — if any — legal protections a crew has on a flagless ship.
UK-based charity Human Rights at Sea said the asphalt tanker had previously been deregistered by the Cook Islands. It was not known to have been entered in another registry at that time.
A photograph provided to TradeWinds in February 2021 showed it was still flying the Cook Islands flag off the stern.
