{"id":113730,"date":"2021-04-21T16:00:44","date_gmt":"2021-04-21T23:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=113730"},"modified":"2021-04-21T16:00:44","modified_gmt":"2021-04-21T23:00:44","slug":"sri-lanka-orders-antigua-registered-vessel-with-radioactive-cargo-out-of-hambantota-port","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/04\/21\/sri-lanka-orders-antigua-registered-vessel-with-radioactive-cargo-out-of-hambantota-port\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka orders Antigua-registered vessel with radioactive cargo out of Hambantota port"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em>Courtesy NewsIn.Asia<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n<p>Colombo, April 21 (AFP): Sri Lankan authorities on Wednesday (21) expelled an Antigua-registered ship that entered the island\u2019s territory without declaring a radioactive cargo bound for China.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The country\u2019s Atomic Energy Regulatory Council (AERC) said the MV BBC Naples was asked to leave after it was found to be in the Chinese-run port of Hambantota on Tuesday (20) night carrying uranium hexafluoride.<ins><\/ins><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ship failed to declare its dangerous cargo \u2013 uranium hexafluoride \u2013 and we decided to order it to leave our waters immediately,\u201d AERC director general Anil Ranjith told AFP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ship had come from Rotterdam but authorities did not say where in China it was headed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ranjith said it was an offence to enter a port without declaring the material, which is used to enrich uranium, the fuel for nuclear power stations and weapons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sri Lanka\u2019s opposition leader Sajith Premadasa demanded an investigation into the incident, describing it as a serious safety threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The navy has not been allowed to board the vessel to carry out an inspection,\u201d Premadasa said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There was no immediate comment from the government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hambantota port was leased to China in 2017 for 99 years after the Colombo government was unable to repay $1.4 million it had borrowed from Beijing to build it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hambantota, about 260 kilometres (162 miles) south of Colombo, is near key Indian Ocean shipping lanes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The entry of two Chinese submarines into Colombo in 2014 angered neighbouring India, the traditional regional power which is competing with Beijing for influence in the Indian Ocean.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since then, Sri Lanka has not allowed Chinese submarine visits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><ins><br> <\/ins><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Courtesy NewsIn.Asia Colombo, April 21 (AFP): Sri Lankan authorities on Wednesday (21) expelled an Antigua-registered ship that entered the island\u2019s territory without declaring a radioactive cargo bound for China. The country\u2019s Atomic Energy Regulatory Council (AERC) said the MV BBC Naples was asked to leave after it was found to be in the Chinese-run port [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-113730","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113730\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}