ICIJ on how the other 1% live !
Dutch prosecutors have fined the company that built Jeff Bezos’ $500 million superyacht after discovering that it had used teak wood from Myanmar in violation of European laws, according to the Dutch newspaper NRC.
On Nov. 26, the Netherlands Public Prosecution Service imposed a $157,000 fine on Oceanco for using the “wrong timber” during the construction of the Koru which, at 417 feet long, is likely the largest and most expensive yacht ever built in the Netherlands, NRC reported.
Following a two-year investigation, prosecutors accused “a Dutch yacht builder” of failing to investigate the origin of the wood used in some of the yacht’s furniture and finishings, which was purchased from an unnamed Turkish woodworking company. “It is therefore no longer possible to determine whether this wood was legally or illegally felled,” prosecutors said in a statement. Reporters at NRC, a partner of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, confirmed the company was Oceanco, which specializes in luxury yacht construction.
Oceanco acknowledged that it failed to comply with the European Timber Regulation, but said it “never intended” to do so, according to the prosecutors’ statement. The company “acknowledges the importance of the EUTR legislation and deeply regrets that this has happened,” it said.
The so-called EUTR, which will soon be replaced by a new law covering seven commodities linked to deforestation, bans the importation of illegally harvested timber and derived products into Europe, and requires companies investigate the origins of timber products before placing them on the market.
Last year, Deforestation Inc., a cross-border investigation by ICIJ with 44 media partners, documented how the law had failed to stop the timber trade from Myanmar as Western companies exploited loopholes and lax controls to import teak from the South Asian country, where exports of local natural resources help finance the military regime.
