Will Iran’s cruise reach the World Cup?

The Iranian cruise ship, which was supposed to transport the passengers of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, is not yet ready to depart. Tourism officials, who are pursuing subsidized fuel supply for this passenger ship, have promised that this ship will depart next week.

According to Isna, this June, during the negotiations between Iran and Qatar for cooperation in the 2022 World Cup and considering the restriction of accommodation in the host country, the CEO of Ports and Maritime Organization announced that “Iran supports the Football World Cup from Kish Island and All comfort facilities, including hotels and tourist accommodations, as well as marine facilities in Hormozgan province, will be available to travelers during the 2022 Qatar World Cup. One of Iran’s maritime facilities is the “Sani” passenger and tourist ship. This ship with acceptable capacity is ready to serve the passengers of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.”

Rostam Ghasemi, the Minister of Roads and Urban Development, also said: “Iranians can travel to Qatar using a cruise ship in the morning and watch the game they want and return to the country at night.”

In August 1401, this passenger vessel entered the dry dock of a shipbuilding complex in the south of Iran with the aim of participating in the 2022 World Cup in Qatar for periodic repairs. On the other hand, in the same month, the government’s resolution regarding the allocation of subsidized fuel to ships, vessels and recreational and passenger boats licensed by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts was amended and announced.

According to the amendment of this resolution, the Ministry of Oil was obliged to allocate subsidized fuel to ships, vessels and pleasure and passenger boats licensed by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts, which are on domestic and international routes from or to Iranian ports in the Persian Gulf and to calculate the amount of 80% subsidy and 20% rate of refueling services to ships (bankrink) regardless of their flag.

Allocating subsidized fuel to make sea travel more affordable, especially during the World Cup in Qatar, despite the notification of such a resolution, is still an unresolved issue. Hossein Abbasnejad, Director General of Maritime Affairs of the Ports Organization, said in this regard a while ago: Despite the promises they made, fuel subsidies have not yet been given to passenger vessels, while it was supposed to be given to vessels of international lines whose origin and destination are Iran. is, to receive a fuel subsidy.

According to him, with the implementation of this decree, the fuel price will decrease from 23 thousand tomans to 300 tomans and it will greatly affect the ticket prices of passenger vessels. Because 45% of the cost of a boat ticket goes back to fuel.

Nevertheless, the correct implementation of this decree is still neglected. In September, Ezzatullah Zarghami – the Minister of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts – in a short message he published on Twitter about the meeting with the owners of large pleasure boats, Saeed Mohammad (former secretary of the Supreme Council of Free Commercial, Industrial and Special Economic Zones of the country) and Javad Oji ( Minister of Oil) informed that the subject of their conversation was to speed up delivery of subsidized fuel and preparation of Kish port.

Apart from the issue of providing subsidized fuel for the Iranian vessel, which has been talked about for more than four months, to be used in the World Cup, another challenge is the long time it takes to repair this ship, which has raised the possibility that it will miss the 2022 World Cup.

However, Sohrab Benavand – Director General of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts of Hormozgan – announced that “the Sunny ship to serve the tourists and travelers of the Qatar World Cup will be ready to depart next week in the presence of the Minister of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts in Bandar Abbas.”

He said, “In the visit we had to this ship on Wednesday, November 11, 1401, along with the advisor of the Minister of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts, special orders were issued by Engineer Zarghami – the Minister of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts – to speed up the preparation of this ship.”

According to the Director General of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts of Hormozgan Province, “Sani’s ship travels from Kish to Doha in 10 hours with a speed of 12 to 16 knots per hour.”

In addition, the Chief Justice of Hormozgan has also given special judicial orders during his visit to Iran’s Offshore Shipbuilding Complex (ISOICO) to speed up the preparation of the cruise ship “Sunny” to reach the World Cup in Qatar.

This passenger vessel, which was built in Sweden based on its birth certificate in 1982, entered the shores of this island around 1396, when Ali Asghar Monsan was the CEO of the Kish Free Zone, so that, according to Monsan, “with the arrival of this cruise, trips between the islands of Kish And Qeshm will be realized in the first stage, and after that, it will be done between other islands and in the future on the way to Dubai.”

It is said that this vessel is the largest quasi-cruise vessel in the country with a length of 172 meters, a width of 23 meters and a water inlet of 5.8 meters. This passenger ship is built for short-term voyages of four to seven days and has a total of 417 beds, which are arranged in cabins and rooms with one, two, three and four beds on the 2nd, 5th, 6th and 8th floors. The capacity of the ship is 300 passengers in long distances with overnight accommodation and in short distances the capacity is at least 925 passengers without beds and cabins.

This ship has a restaurant with a capacity of 300 people, a coffee shop with a capacity of 150 people, a cinema, a children’s playroom, a gym, a store, a kitchen and a doctor’s room. This passenger float has the ability to move more than 200 cars with passengers.

Due to the fact that this passenger ship is not yet ready to depart and the exact time of its passenger acceptance has not been determined, the cost of traveling with it to Qatar during the World Cup is not known at the moment.

The use of giant ships and vessels with accommodation capacity in the 2022 World Cup is mostly due to the fact that Qatar, as the host of one of the biggest sporting events in the world, faces a severe shortage of accommodation due to its limited geography. On the other hand, the World Cup in Qatar has been called one of the most expensive World Cups in this country due to the prices and costs, therefore, many countries in the Persian Gulf region have provided conditions to make it affordable for World Cup fans to attend in Qatar. do