Russian fishing vessel ordered to leave, but remains in port
The Azurit is still in Båtsfjord, one week after the Norwegian Government made a special order for the ship to leave for security reasons. Finnmark Police gave a deadline to depart by midnight Friday, but as of Saturday morning the vessel has not left.
It was last Friday the King in Council made the highly unusual ruling, ordering the Russian-flagged fishing vessel to leave Norway.
Pointing to the Security Act, the vessel got a deadline of five days to sail out and leave the country, the government decision says.
If the order is not followed, Norwegian officials are given permission to tow the vessel out to sea.
Although the decision was taken last Friday, its content was not made public before Thursday this week. The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Fisheries has not yet replied to questions from the Barents Observer on the matter and why the Russian-flagged vessel is still in Båtsfjord.
On Monday December 9th, the captain of Azurit entered Norway at Storskog border checkpoint. Upon arrival, he was informed by the police about the demand to sail out and leave Båtsfjord.
"We count five working days from the moment the captain was informed," says Deputy Chief of Police in Finnmark, Trond Eirik Nilsen in a phone interview.
"So, from midnight to Saturday the 14th, we have authority to take needed action," Nilsen says.
One option is to tow the vessel out of port, but the police will first need to make sure Azurit is sea worthy.
That assessment will have to be taken by the Norwegian Maritime Authority.
The 39 meters long Azurit is owned by Oceanprom and has St. Petersburg as homeport according to the Russian Maritime Register of Shipping. The vessel has stayed in Båtsfjord since May this year the ship tracking services like MarineTraffic.com and vesseltracker.com show.
It is still unclear why the owners of the ship decided to keep the vessel docked in the Norwegian port for so long period. Point 4 in the decision by the Government explicitly says civilian economical claims against the vessel is no hinder for Azurit to leave Norway.
Unpaid invoices can't stop the departure.
The Norwegian company Indistrikulde AS has made some work on the vessel and bills amounting to more than 1,2 million kroner (about €92,000) are not paid, according to the newspaper Kyst of Fjord.
Close the ports
Norway was soon to introduce exceptions to EU-sanctions on Russian vessels to European ports after the outbreak of the full-scale war against Ukraine in February 2022. Later, measures were taken to strengthen control and port calls were limited to three ports.
In July this year, the Government tightened the rules further, granting Russian-flagged vessels permission to stay in port for a maximum of five days. The ports open in addition to Båtsfjord are Tromsø and Kirkenes.
The new regulations were introduced amid increased fear of hybrid sabotage operations across Europe by actors linked to Moscow.
Member of the Norwegian Parliament, Ola Elvestuen, has previously said to the Barents Observer that all ports, including Tromsø, Båtsfjord and Kirkenes should be closed for all Russian vessels.
