Ukraine calls on IMO to prepare new legal instrument for freedom of navigation

Ukraine has called the IMO member states to initiate the development of a legally binding international instrument, in cooperation with other international organizations, to ensure freedom of navigation and the protection of merchant vessels and seafarers during war at sea.

Ukraine has urged IMO to prepare a new legally binding instrument to keep merchant ships and seafarers safe in wartime.

Mykola Kalashnyk, Minister for Recovery, Infrastructure, and Transport of Ukraine, has lodged a formal complaint on Monday against Russia in a letter to the International Maritime Organization (IMO).

He requested the International Maritime Organization (IMO) to promote the timely dissemination of verified information on threats to navigation in the Black Sea, the coordination of measures to protect seafarers, assistance to those affected and to the families of the seafarers who have died or gone missing, and to honour the memory of seafarers who have lost their lives at the forthcoming meetings of the relevant IMO bodies, including the Sub-Committee on Human Element, Training and Watchkeeping, with due acknowledgement of the circumstances of their deaths.

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