Egypt searches For missing cargo ship en route for Sudan

February 5, 2008 (CAIRO) — Egyptian government said on Tuesday it has launched a search to find a cargo ship that has gone missing in the Red Sea on its way to Sudan.

Egypt Tuesday launched a search for a cargo ship that went missing with its 14-member crew in the Red Sea several days ago, after leaving an Egyptian port en route for Sudan, a government official said.

The vessel, Badr 1, left Egypt’s Suez Canal carrying a 1,700 metric ton cargo and a crew of nine Egyptians, including the captain, four Sudanese and a Yemeni, said Ahmed al-Quweisny, a foreign ministry official.

The ship’s destination was Port Sudan, but it was unclear when and where the vessel went missing along the 1,280 kilometer route.

Rescue ships are thoroughly combing the area along the stretches of the Sudanese and Egyptian shores backed up by a search plane, said al-Quweisny. But so far, all efforts to locate the ship, which didn’t send a distress signal at the time it went missing, failed.

Meanwhile, a Sudanese official with the transportation ministry, Bridges Fatih Saeed met Tuesday with Egyptian ambassador to Sudan, Mohamed Shazali, to discuss the missing ship. The two said both countries’ shipping authorities would continue doing “their best” to find the vessel, said the state SUNA news agency in Khartoum.

SUNA said the ship, built in 1960 and owned by the Afro-Asia Shipping Company, carried a cargo of cement. The company has said its vessel conformed to all safety requirements and had all needed permits for sailing, according to al-Quweisny.

(AP)