A request for the authorities to be prohibited from selling the fuel held in a ship has been dismissed by the courts after a judge ruled that the necessary elements at law for the issue of a warrant of prohibitory injunction had not been satisfied.

Pierre Darmanin asked the court to prohibit the Police Commissioner, the Harbour Master, Enemalta, the Controller of Customs, the Malta Transport Authority, the Attorney General, the Armed Forces and the Registrar of Courts, from transferring, selling or unloading the fuel legally held on the vessel MV Silverking, which vessel he claimed belonged to him.

The court heard that, on July 1, the Armed Forces noted spillage of fuel outside Maltese territorial waters.

Four vessels which might have been involved in the spillage, including the MV Silverking, were escorted to the harbour and a magisterial inquiry was conducted. This concluded that although the vessel was carrying a load of fuel from Misurata in Libya, it was not involved in the spillage.

After the vessel entered Malta, the authorities decided it could not carry out bunkering operations in Maltese waters as it was only a supply vessel and could not be used for purposes of storing fuel.

This gave rise to safety concerns and the Police Commissioner asked the inquiring magistrate to order that the fuel be removed from the vessel.

The court ordered that the fuel be removed from the vessel at the expense of the Registrar of Courts and used by Enemalta Corporation with the proviso that the owner be compensated if it resulted that no criminal charges were to be filed.

Filing his request for a prohibitory injunction, Mr Darmanin submitted that the fuel had been bought legally and that he could not, therefore, be ordered to give it to Enemalta.

But Mr Justice Joseph Zammit McKeon said that while Mr Darmanin had been very specific in his request he had not told the court that he would suffer irremediable harm if the warrant was not upheld. This was a legal requirement. Furthermore, although Mr Darmanin had claimed to be the owner of the vessel it resulted that it was in fact owned by Silver King Ltd, of which Mr Darmanin was a director.

Neither was Mr Darmanin the owner of the fuel carried by the vessel.