Vietsovpetro on Thursday refused to pay for stopping an oil slick spreading after a tanker carrying its oil exploded and sank off the southern coast of Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province on June 17.

Twelve of its 15 crew members pulled on life jackets and jumped into the water, according to its captain.

Engineer Truong Ngoc Bich of the Vietnam-Russia joint venture said all the oil had burnt in the accident, in which 12 sailors from the Nhat Thuan tanker were rescued and three others are still listed as missing.

Bich was speaking at an emergency meeting with Ba Ria-Vung Tau People’s Committee and the province’s Department of Natural Resources and Environment (DNRE) on measures to salvage the ship and stop the oil spill from spreading.

Nhat Thuan was carrying 1,793 cubic meters or 11,300 barrels of waste oil from one tanker of Vietsovpetro to another offshore tanker of the company for treatment.

The ship was also carrying 10,000 liters of diesel as fuel.

According to the National Agency for Stopping Oil Spills, most of the oil slick is formed by the diesel, while the waste oil also started to leak out, forming a slick more than 1.8 kilometers long and 80 meters wide.

Deputy Director Nguyen Boa of the province’s DNRE said the situation would get worse as oil has not been removed from the ship.

The department on Thursday suggested two solutions: to salvage the ship and move all the oil to another tanker or to leave it underwater and pump the oil out.

Bich said Vietsovpetro will only take responsibility when waste oil is still detected on Nhat Thuan.

Vietsovpetro didn’t directly hire the ship and thus has no responsibility for salvaging it, he said, adding that the company will nevertheless help with the efforts.

Tran Minh Sanh, chairman of the province’s People’s Committee, has asked the Ho Chi Minh City-based Binh Thuan Transport Company that owns Nhat Thuan ship to send someone to inspect the ship’s condition with local officials.

Port authorities and ships from the province’s rescue center are still searching for the missing crew members - a first mate, an engineer and a deckhand, but survivors have said that it was unlikely that their crew survived the explosion.

VietNamNet/TN