A senior official of the Ministry of Justice said that a lawsuit will be filed tomorrow (24) in Singapore demanding compensation for the damage caused to the Sri Lankan environment by the X-Press Pearl container ship which was destroyed by fire in Sri Lankan waters in May 2021.
The official said that the Attorney General’s Department of Sri Lanka has decided to file this case tomorrow (24) before the Singapore Commercial Court since MV X-Press Pearl was owned by a Singapore company.
President Ranil Wickramasinghe last November instructed Justice Minister Wijeyadasa Rajapakshe to take steps to file a case against the relevant shipping company before the International Court of Arbitration in Singapore to get compensation for the damages caused by the destruction of the cargo ship.
The Singapore-registered MV X-Press Pearl container ship carrying a hazardous chemical cargo caught fire on 20 May 2021 while at anchorage 9.5 nm off Colombo Harbor due to a chemical leak in a container and burned for 13 days before the fire was put out on 2nd June. The ship along with its hazardous cargo sank afterwards.
The sinking of the freighter with the hazardous chemicals and plastic pellets was recorded as the worst maritime disaster ever to strike the island, significantly impacting the island’s coastal environment and affecting the livelihood of fishing community.