Elida Moreno News

Panama's maritime authority said on Monday it has no knowledge of ships owned by Iranians being in its registry, following concerns from U.S.

The United States has asked Panama to ban Iranian vessels sanctioned by Washington from using its flag, U.S. State Department special envoy Abram Paley said on Wednesday.Paley said the request aims to prevent ships from being used for illegal actions such as supporting groups designated as Iranian terrorist organizations with oil sales.In January 2023, Panama's maritime authority said it had withdrawn its flag from 136 ships linked to Iran's state oil company in the last four years.

The Panama Canal sees no need for further vessel transit restrictions until at least April, when its authority will evaluate water levels at the end of the dry season, Deputy Administrator Ilya Espino told Reuters.A severe drought last year forced the canal to reduce the number of vessels allowed to pass per day. In December, rains in the last quarter of the year allowed the waterway to suspend further restrictions that would have been applied in January.In recent months, attacks to ships at the Red Sea have prompted many vessel owners to take longer routes to and from Asia…

The Panama Canal's toll revenues have dipped by about $100 million per month since last October, the canal's administrator said on Wednesday, adding that if the trend continues reduced income from tolls could total some $700 million by around April.The falling revenue stems from drought conditions that have forced the canal's managers to impose shipping restrictions on the more than century-old waterway, a key global trade route linking the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans.The canal's fiscal year begins in October, and runs through September.Canal Administrator Ricaurte Vasquez described the contin

The Panama Canal Authority said on Thursday it has not seen a notable traffic increase due to the situation in the Red Sea, where attacks by Yemen's Houthi group are forcing vessels to divert or switch their transponders off.The hostilities have put a chokehold on ship passages through the Suez Canal, which handles about 12% of worldwide trade, and according to analysts could end up forcing some vessel owners to try to pass the Panama Canal even amid transit restrictions due to severe drought."To date…

Daily ship crossings on the Panama Canal, one of the world's main maritime trade routes, will be reduced to 31 from 32 to soften the impact from a severe drought that is expected to last until next year, the authorities managing the canal said.The Panama Canal Authority (ACP) in recent months has imposed various passage restrictions to conserve water, including cutting vessel draft and daily passage authorizations, which are normally 36 per day.ACP said late on Friday that due to the ongoing water crisis…

The Panama Canal expects to maintain restrictions on daily vessel transit and maximum draft for at least 10 more months amid a prolonged drought that has lowered the water level, an official from the waterway said on Thursday.The canal's authority earlier this year began imposing restrictions, causing a backlog of vessels waiting to pass. The curbs have forced vessel owners to lighten cargoes or shift to alternate routes as freight costs increase for some routes.The extension of the restrictions would give the canal room for preserving water before the next rainy season arrives…

Before the Ever Max ship carrying lava lamps, sofas, Halloween costumes and artificial Christmas trees could make its inaugural Panama Canal voyage this month, a historic drought forced it to drop weight by offloading hundreds of containers.Weather-related disruptions denied the vessel, owned by Taiwanese shipping company Evergreen Marine, a chance on Aug. 1 to set a record for carrying the most containers through the vital maritime shortcut that connects the Pacific and Atlantic…

The Panama Canal Authority on Wednesday notified shippers it is extending through September 2 restrictions for vessels to transit through the waterway and keeping the number of vessels authorized to pass per day to a maximum of 32.The Canal restrictions, implemented in recent months as the rainy season in Panama has come late this year, could add more pressure on consumer goods prices, according to maritime firms and experts, as delays and extra fees add to shipping costs.The Panama Canal is key for moving consumer goods from Asia to the United States…

The drought-hit Panama Canal has temporarily limited the number of new reserved passage slots to help ease a bottleneck of ships that are waiting to transit without reservations, the waterway's authority said on Thursday.A logjam of commercial vessels seeking to pass through the canal, one of the world's busiest trade passages, has sent companies that typically use the waterway chasing alternative routes, according to executives and data.Any delay or disruption can put shippers on edge.

The Panama Maritime Authority (AMP) said on Tuesday it would continue to clean up its fleet to prevent substandard Panama-flagged ships from being detained in foreign ports, a week after the country was added to an international watch list.Panama's ships registry was last week added to the "grey list" of the Paris Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), an agreement among 27 countries establishing an international inspection regime for foreign ships in other nations' ports, aiming…

The Panama Canal will impose lower draft restrictions on the largest ships passing through the key global trade route due to falling water levels at nearby lakes that form part of the waterway, the canal authority said on Tuesday.The restrictions, which will take effect on Wednesday, mean so-called neo-Panamex container ships seeking to cross the canal connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans must comply with a maximum depth of 47.5 feet, down from 50 feet, forcing them to weigh less or otherwise transport fewer goods.The new measures are due to recent drought conditions…

Panama's vessel registry, the world's largest, has withdrawn its flag from 136 ships linked to Iran's state oil company in the last four years, the country's maritime authority said this week, pushing back against claims by an anti-nuclear group.Shipments of Iranian crude hit all-time highs in the last two months of 2022 and had a strong start this year, according to flow tracking firms. Those gains come despite U.S. sanctions on companies it accuses of helping Iran export oil…

The Panama Canal has seen a 30% fall in the traffic of vessels carrying liquefied natural gas (LNG), driven by Asia's weak demand for U.S. LNG and limited exports from the U.S. Gulf Coast since a terminal explosion in June, the waterway's authority told Reuters this week.Second-largest U.S. exporter Freeport LNG's Texas plant continues shut since an explosion in early June and its partial restart is not expected until October, curtailing the U.S. export capacity, even amid buoyant demand in Europe.Before the incident…

Three Panamanian-flagged ships have been hit by Russian missiles in the Black Sea since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last month, Panama’s Maritime Authority said on Wednesday.One ship sank, the maritime authority said in a statement, but there were no casualties reported. The two others remain afloat with damages.“We know that we had three ships that were attacked by Russian missiles but the crew is all safe, we had material damage,” said Noriel Arauz, the administrator of the Panama Maritime Authority (AMP).The three affected ships were Namura Queen, Lord Nelson and Helt.

Warmer temperatures this winter in Asia and higher gas demand in Europe are cutting demand for transit of vessels carrying liquefied natural gas (LNG) through the Panama Canal, the waterway's authority told Reuters on Wednesday.The canal overall is facing higher seasonal demand for vessel passage with an average of 39 ships per day, and it is working to accommodate vessels arriving without reservation for passage, the Panama Canal Authority added.(Reuters - Reporting by Elida Moreno, writing by Marianna Parraga)

The Panama Canal moved more than a half a billion tonnes of goods over the last year, the canal's top official said on Thursday, marking a record high for the key global waterway as international trade picked up.Ricaurte Vasquez, the Panama Canal Authority's administrator, told reporters during a webcast news conference that 516.7 million tonnes of goods passed through the century-old waterway during the 2021 fiscal year, which ended in September."It's been an exceptional year," he said, noting it was the first time the canal transported more than 500 million tonnes of goods during the 12-mont

Panama expects to award an $18-million contract between late 2021 and early 2022 for the upgrade and operation of a large shipyard near the Canal, which has been only partially working since last year, authorities told Reuters.After taking back state-owned Balboa's Shipyard from private operation, the maritime authority in mid-2020 awarded temporary concessions for portions of the facility, including two of its three dry docks, to avoid a long suspension of labor in the shipyard following two years of paralysis.The new operator of the facility…

Congestion delaying LNG shipments via the Panama Canal is expected to last through the peak demand winter months, traders close to the situation said, although the canal's regulator said it had made changes to speed up transit.The price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and shipping rates have hit record highs because of the bottleneck, supply constraints and heavy demand from Asia, where freezing weather has placed the energy supply system under strain.Ships carrying LNG from the United States to meet the Asian demand waited for up to two weeks in December to navigate the canal.

The Panama Canal Authority said it won an arbitration ruling on Friday for $265 million to be returned to it from the consortium that built a third set of locks for the key transoceanic waterway.The authority cited a decision from a Miami-based arbitration board it said was issued earlier on Friday.The GUPC consortium, which includes Spain's Sacyr SA and Italy's Impregilo International Infrastructures NV, no longer exists. Neither company could not be reached for comment after hours on Friday.Initiated in 2015, the case centered on disputed cost overruns largely dealing with concrete quality.

In the murky story of how a cache of highly explosive ammonium nitrate ended up on the Beirut waterfront, one thing is clear—no one has ever publicly come forward to claim it.There are many unanswered questions surrounding last week's huge, deadly blast in the Lebanese capital, but ownership should be among the easiest to resolve.Clear identification of ownership, especially of a cargo as dangerous as that carried by the Moldovan-flagged Rhosus when it sailed into Beirut seven years ago, is fundamental to shipping, the key to insuring it and settling disputes that often arise.But Reuters interviews and trawls for documents across 10 countries in search of the original ownership of this 2…

Several companies that certify vessels are seaworthy and ship insurers have withdrawn services to tankers involved in the Venezuelan oil trade as the United States targets the maritime industry to tighten sanctions on the Latin American country.U.S. sanctions have driven Venezuela’s oil exports to their lowest levels in nearly 80 years, starving President Nicolas Maduro’s socialist government of its main source of revenue and leaving authorities short of cash for essential imports such as food and medicine.The sanctions are part of U.S.

Panama's Maritime Authority said it will impose sanctions on vessels, including fines of up to $10,000 and withdrawing its flag from the ship, if they deliberately deactivate, tamper or alter the operation of their tracking transponders."This General Directorate of Merchant Marine will impose sanctions to all those Panamanian flagged vessels that deliberately deactivate, tamper or alter the operation of Long Range Identification and Tracking System or the Automatic Identification System…