The port of Ravenna halted the transit of two containers carrying explosives bound for Haifa in Israel. The cargo, which had arrived by land from Austria, was due to be loaded onto the vessel Contship Era, operated by the shipping company Zim, with a final destination in the Middle East. The handling had been assigned to the workforce of the Compagnia Portuale, but an internal mobilisation and the intervention of local authorities stopped the operation.
The mayor of Ravenna, Alessandro Barattoni, together with the president of the Emilia-Romagna region, Michele De Pascale, and the president of the province, Valentina Palli, sent a communication to the management of Sapir, the company that runs the Darsena San Vitale terminal. In their letter, they called for the shipment to be blocked and for an explicit reference to respect for human rights and peace to be included in the company’s code of ethics. The stance of the local authorities proved decisive, as the institutions are shareholders in the terminal operator, which subsequently declared it would not allow the entry of military material into its yards.
In an internal note, the Compagnia Portuale stressed that handling containers containing armaments poses a regulatory grey area and represents an operational and labour relations risk, with the potential to disrupt vessel operations and overall port activities. The same concerns had already emerged at the end of June, when mayor Barattoni had asked the transport ministry for clarification following a previous shipment of weapons on the vessel Zim New Zealand.
The case unfolds against the backdrop of wider scrutiny of Ravenna’s role as a logistics hub. In recent days, the Cuar, the unitary committee of Ravenna’s road haulage associations, held its general assembly, bringing together Cna Fita, Confartigianato Trasporti, Confcooperative Romagna and Legacoop Servizi Romagna. The meeting, convened to address the area’s operational challenges, opened with a statement of support for the mayor’s position and with the associations committing to share their opposition to the use of the port for the transit of military supplies bound for Israel.
