Ship at heart of Beirut blast changed hands before fateful shipment, former owner says

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - The Cypriot entrepreneur accused of being the owner of a ship at the heart of last month’s devastating explosion in Beirut, which killed 190 and wreaked havoc across the Lebanese capital, has spoken out publicly for the first time to deny his involvement.

Speaking exclusively to The National, Charalombos Manoli expressed his “deepest sorrow” for the losses caused by the explosion, but said that claims he was the owner of the MV Rhosus are “entirely inaccurate”.

I hope that they are going to find the people who actually left this cargo at Beirut port

Charalombos Manoli

An investigation last month by a number of media outlets – including the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project and German newspaper Der Spiegel – claimed Mr Manoli was the true owner of the ship, not Russian national Igor Grucheshkin, as had been previously reported.

However, according to a ship Continuous Synopsis Record provided by Mr Manoli, control of the Rhosus was signed over to Mr Grucheshkin’s Teto Shipping in 2012, a year before the boat made an unscheduled stop at Beirut, where it and its cargo of 2,750 tonnes of ammonium nitrate were impounded.

According to risk consultancy Control Risks, a CSR is a log book required for specific vessel types that remains with the vessel throughout its lifecycle and details changes of ownership, flag, name, class, and other details.

Mr Manoli says that the accusations have caused him stress and a lot of unwanted attention.

“It’s very frustrating for me and my family. Eight years after I sold the vessel someone is accusing me of bringing the cargo to Beirut and other things. People died and were injured – it’s not very good for me, my family or my business,” he said by phone from the Cypriot city of Limassol.

“I know how people feel because in 2011 there was a big explosion here in Cyprus. Fortunately not as many died, but we have the same feeling.”

Twelve people were killed that year in a blast at a naval base in southern Cyprus.

“I hope that they are going to find the people who actually left this cargo [at Beirut port] for such a long time without any care, bringing us to this horrible result,” said Mr Manoli.

In late 2013, the Rhosus made an unscheduled stop at Beirut port while carrying a cargo of ammonium nitrate to a chemical explosives factory in Mozambique.

The ship’s captain has since told the media he was told to stop to pick up additional cargo. Two Lebanese companies claimed they had not been paid for services to the vessel while there, prompting local courts to bar it from leaving.

The boat and the ammonium nitrate it had been carrying remained there until, on August 4 this year, the hanger the cargo was stored ignited, causing one of the biggest non-atomic blasts on record.

Mystery has since surrounded the ship and its cargo. Speculation that the boat had always been bound for Beirut and that the Shiite militant group Hezbollah was the true owner of the shipment of a substance that is used both as a fertiliser and in explosives remains unfounded.

Mr Grechushkin, the Russian man described as the owner or operator of the Moldovan-flagged Rhosus, is said to have abandoned the vessel in Lebanon after declaring bankruptcy.

Although Mr Grechuschkin was questioned by the Cypriot police on behalf of the Lebanese authorities following the blast, Mr Manoli says he has not been approached for questioning.

“The Lebanese authorities know who the owner [of the boat] is, who fixed the cargo, who was responsible for the crew, who picked the captain because of the documents within the local court. Why would they come to me?” he said.

Although they know one another, the two men have spoken only twice in the last two and a half years, Mr Manoli claimed.

“I recently spoke to him one time on the mobile and he said he was going to give the police a statement. I have no special relationship with the guy,” he said.

Mr Grechuschkin has not responded to attempts to contact him.

The OCCRP reported that as well as being the true owner of the boat, Mr Manoli had been in debt to Lebanese-owned Federal Bank of the Middle East at the time of the boat’s last voyage.

It said that the bank has lost multiple licenses for alleged money laundering offences, including helping Hezbollah, and a company linked to Syria’s weapons of mass destruction programme.

It also claimed that the factory in Mozambique the cargo was destined for “is part of a network of companies previously investigated for weapons trafficking and allegedly supplying explosives used by terrorists”.

Mr Manoli said that he had nothing to do with the journey the boat was taking when it was seized in Beirut, nor the cargo, although he knew the boat was stuck at the port as Cyprus’ shipping community is small, “so we know what is happening”.

The shipping magnate said that any implication that he was in some way pressured by the bank to do favours for anyone were unfounded.

“They didn’t make me do any favours. They took the vessel for three months and after that we signed an agreement, and they released the vessel,” he said.

“What would they ask me to do? We had been fighting each other.”

Cypriot court documents in Greek provided by Mr Manoli show that in a case brought against him by FBME in 2013, it was deemed that more than the full amount had been paid to the plaintiff and the action against him was withdrawn in 2018.

“At this time it was declared by the judge that ‘by mathematical calculation we can verify that the vessel is already overpaid’. However, they said, because you have declared that you have extra items etc, I will minimise this demand and then we see during the trial,” he said.

“During the trial, the FBME demands were rejected.”

On claims that the vessel had been unseaworthy and had been certified as able to sail by another company owned by Mr Manoli, he said that these were also unfair.

“After the completion of repairs in Seville, the Spanish authorities gave permission for the vessel to go to sea,” he said.

"If it was unseaworthy, they would never allow this."