Argentina’s dredgers union assured a safe passage for when the Navy’s flag ship ARA Libertad arrives to Mar del Plata next 9 January to a big reception party headed by President Cristina Fernandez. There were concerns that the depth of the access channel wouldn’t be enough.
The Argentine navy is not going through one of its great moments, not only because of the impounded flagship ARA Libertad in Ghana and the ARA Espora stranded in South Africa waiting for spares. The rest of the fleet is suffering the consequences of years of lack of maintenance and training with corvettes, destroyers and even submarines involved in mechanical and conducting incidents.
The Argentine Navy said that repair works in the corvette ARA Espora, which has been stranded in South Africa for over five weeks “are 65% completed” and denied there were any debts pending with the German company that is responsible for the maintenance of the MEKO class corvettes as was reported earlier in the Buenos Aires press.
Argentine Economy Minister Hernán Lorenzino called for developed countries to set limits to ‘vulture funds’ and credit rating agencies as “promoters of the global crisis,” as he addressed the G20 Finance Ministers meeting in Mexico on Sunday.
When Argentina still has not recovered from the impounding of the Navy’s flagship, ARA Libertad, retained in Ghana, another piece of bad news was confirmed in Pretoria on Friday when South African Foreign minister admitted that a second navy vessel, ARA Espora, docked in Simonstown was exposed to a similar fate.
A second Argentine navy vessel has been targeted by NML-Capital which apparently has contracted a renowned South African law office to impound the corvette ARA Espora.
A second Argentine Navy vessel remains retained in Africa, although this time because of mechanical problems. So far this month the Argentine navy has suffered the ‘loss’ of three of its units: two corvettes and the training frigate ARA Libertad.