The aircraft carrier Sao Paulo (ex-Foch) was sailing off Morocco when the decision was made public: Turkey will not finally welcome the building in the port of Izmir, contrary to what was planned in the initial itinerary. “The ship will not be allowed to enter Turkish territorial waters”announced on Friday August 26, Murat Kurum, Minister of the Environment, in a press release shared on Twitter.
Built in France in the early 1960s, the aircraft carrier Fochtwin brother of Clemenceau, served in the French Navy for thirty-seven years before being sold to Brazil in 2000. The aging building required numerous repairs and high maintenance costs: the Brazilian Navy finally decided to decommission it in 2017 Leaving Rio de Janeiro on August 4, the ship had completed its transatlantic crossing and was due to arrive on September 10. Acquired by the Turkish company SÖK Denizcilik, it was to be moored in the port of Izmir, in the Aliaga area specializing in the dismantling of ships.
An inventory of hazardous substances required
But in a letter dated August 9 addressed to Brasilia, the Turkish Ministry of the Environment asked for the delivery of a new “hazardous substances inventory”. The Brazilian authorities responded by referring Ankara to its authorization, issued on June 7, citing a late request, subsequent to the launch of the ship.
“The cancellation of the Turkish ministry is a very direct result of the citizen mobilization of recent weeks”welcomes the lawyer Arif Ali Cangi, member of the collective of environmental associations and professional chambers of Izmir who launched a legal action against the ministry. “Two days ago, the Minister said that the boat was clean! » he recalls.
If the seven local associations and the forty individuals at the initiative of the complaint consider this decision as a first victory, “The fight doesn’t stop there”, assures Arif Ali Cangi. It is now a question of sending the boat back to Brazil, but the responsibility is shared with other countries: “France, as a builder, has a responsibility. Holland too, since it is with a tug flying the flag of the Netherlands that the aircraft carrier is towed. Above all, he must not pass the Strait of Gibraltar! »
Renamed the “ship of death”
Since the beginning of the month, a mobilization of civil society has been trying to alert the French and Turkish authorities to the illegality of the transfer of the military building, renamed for the occasion “the boat of death”. Several specialized international NGOs had in particular drawn attention to the danger that the dismantling could represent.
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