Baku, Azerbaijan, May 28
By Fatih Karimov - Trend:
The problem of providing Protection and Indemnity (P&I) insurance coverage to the National Iranian Oil Company (NITC) tankers is settled, Ali-Akbar Safaei, managing director of the NITC, said.
The International Group of the Protection and Indemnity (P&I) Clubs will start providing insurance coverage to Iranian tankers in coming days, Safaei said, IRIB news agency reported May 28.
Despite of implementation of nuclear Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and removal of insurance sanctions against Iran, the P&I clubs was not able to provide full coverage for tankers as the American insurance industry players are still banned from doing business with Iran and the clubs partially work under the US insurance policies.
Meanwhile Safaei said that one of the 13 members of the P&I clubs which is American is not able to cooperate with Iran, but other 12 members have approved to provide insurance coverage to Iranian vessels.
He further said that as soon as the insurance coverage is implemented Iranian tankers will sail back into the European waters.
In the absence of the European insurers, Iran's state-backed Kish P&I club currently insures the Islamic Republic's oil shipments to India, as well as China and Turkey.
However, the National Iranian Oil Company says most of its customers prefer the International Group of the Protection and Indemnity Clubs to provide insurance for tankers.
NITC, the privatized Iranian shipping company, says it has 42 very large crude carriers, known as VLCCs, after buying 20 such China-built vessels in the recent years.
Iran was forced to rely more on NITC, the former state-owned shipping company, to transport crude oil after Europe imposed sanctions on Iran and banned insurers from covering ships carrying the Iranian crude.
Under the sanctions Iran's oil export was limited to certain countries including China, India, South Korea and Turkey, which was mainly carried by the NITC fleet.