Aung Soe Moe Kyaw ferry capsized in Chindwin River on October 15, 2016. In this accident, more than 40 people including school teachers and students were dead to date and the number of missing people has been risen, while the search for missing people is continuing. Our Independent Federation of Myanmar Seafarers (IFOMS) was terrified that many lives lost in this tragedy and give our condolence to their families.

Such tragic accidents express that there are weak regulatory procedures for local shipping lines, lack of a secure and flexible law for passengers and crew and failing to implement existing laws to be taken into effect.

Currently, it is planning to implement a firm regulation called MLC 2006 which can make sure of safety for international water transport, and it requires the government to sign. But this MLC 2006 doesn’t cover inland water transport. Therefore, for inland water transport, our IMFOS urges the government and respective authority bodies to give effort into appearing a secure and flexible law which can give guarantee for safety of passengers and crew members, like MLC 2006.