Hanoi: Vinalines, already belaboured with extraordinary debts, has lost a court fight and must pay a Korean engineering firm $3.07m in compensation for breaking a port development contract.
The Vietnam International Arbitration Center (VIAC) sided with South Korean conglomerate SK E&C, which had claimed the nation’s top shipping line had broken a contract on the construction of a terminal at Van Phong transit port in Khanh Hoa province.
Since the case has been ongoing for a long time the South Korean firm had managed to get a couple of ships arrested in Korean waters.
In September 2012 the government decided to halt Vinalines’ Van Phong International Transshipment Port project in central Khanh Hoa Province after three years of delay. The total project with quaysides in excess of 12.5km was originally expected to cost $3.6bn. The first phase of the deepwater project was meant to be completed in 2011. [29/07/14]
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