For the ISC, pandemics and war are the same thing

This seems to be the reaction of some employers and some trade unions that, beyond generous declarations of principle, on the one hand fear the consequences on their economic activities and on the other, ready to take sides when they are clear who is Hitler, they seem unsure about who said or did what. The conduct of the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the International Transport Workers 'Federation (ITF), for which the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF), appears to be truly embarrassing, is truly embarrassing. conflict does not exist, on the entrepreneurial one the refrain is : to avoid as the plague measures that cause us to be further problems.

If the tomb silence of the ILO and the ITF is, to put it all, shameful, it sounds false and hypocritical of the appeal, to stay in the world of transportation, of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) association that pulls the ball into dance maritime security : "the safety of seafarers has been our absolute priority," Secretary General Guy Platten said. We call on all parties-invited the representative of the ICS-to ensure that seafarers do not become collateral damage as part of any action that governments or others can take. "

Already, the governments. But-could it be replicated in Platten-what actions can ever decide if any action, from the most blatant sanction to the most resolute military intervention, is inevitable that it will hurt anyone? " The seafarers-it's the refrain of the ICS-have been at the forefront of safeguarding the flow of trade trades during the pandemic and we hope that at this time all parties will continue to facilitate the free passage of goods and these essential workers. " All the goods? Pure those under sanctions. Even the weapons? With regard to the latter, if the owners, at least some of them, do not go too thin when it comes to loading these goods onto their ships, unions sometimes-but, it seems, not now-are more pundits in demanding that the vessels do not carry instruments of death.

The International Chamber of Shipping showed that 10.5% percent of the 1.89 million seafarers who overall work on the more than 74mila ships of the world's merchant fleet, i.e. 198,123, are Russians, of which 71,652 officers and 126,471 municipalities, while 4% of the total consists of the 76,442 Ukrainian seafarers, of which 47,058 officers and 29,383 municipalities. Russians and Ukrainians account for 14.5% percent of world seafarers. For the ICS, these and other seafarers "must be able to disembark and embark on ships, with the change of the crew, all over the world." Perhaps in all the world not, it would be observed, since it is currently in Ukrainian ports that no ships can arrive if not Russian ships and Ukrainian ships do not have a good reception in Russian ports (who knows, perhaps seafarers). Ukrainians yes).

For ICS, seafarers, or better ships, must continue to navigate everywhere and anyway. Like during the pandemic. Perhaps Platten and his association did not realize that the one in place since yesterday is not a fast-spreading outbreak caused by a culpable virus. The one we're talking about is a war. At least in this case let us not hide behind the alibi of the welfare of the seafarers.

B.B.