(4 minutes read)
· The Seychelles’ Minister for Fisheries wanted the owners of European Union fishing vessels to pay immediately compensation to seafarers working in their (EUs) fishing vessels
· The minister said that EU was still asking for figures and technical details of those seafarers, though the details were sent already several times
· The details sent to EU included the share of compensation to be paid by the Spanish and French vessels
The Seychelles’ Minister for Fisheries wanted the owners of European Union fishing vessels to pay immediate compensation to seafarers working in their (EUs) fishing vessels. The Seychelles’ government has asked the vessels to give an update on the progress of the negotiations. This was stated by the minister of fishing Jean-Francois Ferrari at a press conference recently.
The minister said that the EU was still asking for figures and technical details of those seafarers, though the details were sent already several times. The details sent to the EU included the share of compensation to be paid by the Spanish and French vessels. The EU officials said that they would take a few more days to work out the details. Seychelles government would continue to take up the issue till the compensation is paid in full. The final sum of compensation was still to be decided upon as yet.
According to the Seychelles Fishing Authority (SFA), from 2005 to 2014 there were 116 claims amounting to US$ 789,000 worth of compensation to be paid to seafarers who were working on those vessels at that time. Of this, 78 claims are paid with all relevant details and documents intact. In the case of 38 claims, information is missing. Between 2014 and 2020 there were 69 claims received. Of that, 66 claims have been paid worth US$230,000 and three were pending.
