LONDON — Australia's refusal to accept a Norwegian cargo ship that rescued 438 Afghan refugees from a sinking ferry endangers the time-honored practice of saving people at sea, the shipping industry warned.
The captain of the Tampa did his duty under international maritime law when he responded to a distress call on Monday and picked up the refugees when the ferry carrying them illegally from Indonesia to Australia began to founder, ship owners said Wednesday.
They charge that Australia is now violating its moral obligations.
"The Tampa's captain did what he is supposed to do and maybe a little bit more. He behaved in a very, very orderly and seamen-like fashion," said Ove Tvedt, deputy head of the Copenhagen-based Baltic and International Maritime Council, which represents about 1,000 ship owners worldwide.
"But now he is being barred from putting people ashore. . . . I shudder at the thought of what message this sends."
Shipowners are bound by international maritime law to come to the aid of any vessel in trouble on the seas — a law adopted two years after ships failed to respond quickly to distress calls from the sinking Titanic.
But the shipping industry warned that a dangerous precedent already exists for ships to simply shirk their duties, particularly if they fear getting caught up in the kind of standoff currently facing the Norwegian vessel.
In the late 1980s, Vietnamese "boat people" fleeing political persecution or poverty were often left to die on rough seas by captains who did not want the hassle that came with picking them up, said Chris Horrocks, secretary-general of the International Chamber of Shipping.
A U.S. military jury convicted Navy Capt. Alexander Balian of dereliction of duty in 1989 for failing to help a boatload of Vietnamese refugees who later resorted to cannibalism to survive.
Eventually, the U.N. High Commission for Refugees worked out guidelines for ships that encounter refugees in distress. Shipowners said that reassured the industry for a while, but in recent years, the problems have re-emerged.
"This is not the first such incident . . . but it has become the cause celebre because it is the first to focus so heavily on the plight of a particular ship," said Horrocks.
The Wallenius Wilhelmsen shipping line, which operates the Tampa, said the vessel picked up the refugees — mostly Afghanis — after being contacted by the Australian coast guard. But when the Tampa then continued toward Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean to unload its new human cargo, Australian authorities banned it from entering Australian waters.
The ship has since violated that ban but is still being refused permission to dock, despite the captain's pleas that some passengers require urgent medical attention and the overcrowded ship is no longer seaworthy.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard argued that the refugees were rescued in international waters and should have been taken to the closest port, which was in Indonesia.
Natasha Brown, spokeswoman for the International Maritime Organization, a United-Nations affiliated agency which provides oversight to shippers, said it is difficult to judge whether Australia has acted illegally because the laws that govern rescues at sea are so vague.
"The convention is couched in terms which could be interpreted differently," she said.
But Brown added that the problem probably wouldn't have arisen if the Tampa had responded to a distress call from, say, a holiday liner full of passengers who would willingly return to their home countries.
Jim Davis of the International Maritime Industries Forum, an umbrella group for the shipping industry, said his sympathy lies with the boat's captain, but he warned that the refugees might have knowingly taken advantage of "the fellowship of the sea."
He said the ship's captain shouldn't be made the victim — by the refugees or an Australian government fed up with illegal immigrants.
"This is a problem that is attacking some of the long-held traditions of the sea," Davis said. "The international community needs to address it now because it is one that certainly all the developed nations are likely to face sooner or later."