UN, Netherlands to hold pledging event to avert oil tanker disaster off Yemen

UNITED NATIONS, May 10 (Xinhua) -- The United Nations and the Netherlands will co-host a pledging conference to help prevent an oil spill from the derelict tanker Safer anchored off Yemen, a UN spokesman said on Tuesday.

The conference in The Hague opens on Wednesday, said Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The planned 144-million-U.S.-dollar operation, endorsed by parties to the Yemen conflict and stakeholders, calls for offloading more than 1 million barrels of oil aboard the rusting tanker to an equivalent size vessel outside the Red Sea port of Hodeidah.

"We need donors to urgently commit the funds before the window to transfer the oil closes," said Haq. "The world needs to act now, or the time bomb will continue ticking."

The world body has long warned the rusting, 48-year-old Safer would leak its cargo, creating an environmental disaster for the shores of the Red Sea.

In March, the United Nations and the rebel Houthi militia reached an accord on the operation, endorsed by Yemen's internationally recognized government in Sanaa.

The Netherlands is lending its maritime expertise to the project.

For seven years, the derelict Safer sat off Hodeidah, now controlled by the Houthis. The militia had previously obstructed UN efforts to send inspectors to assess the tanker's condition or offload the oil.