A Japanese-owned bulker has been seized in Texas in a legal dispute over dirty scrap metal.

Viohalco-linked International Trade filed a $1.5m lawsuit in the US court for the Southern District of Texas on Tuesday, alleging the scrap was damaged on board the 63,440-dwt, Shoei Kisen Kaisha-connected Ocean Innovation (built 2016).

The complaint said a pair of surveyors issued reports stating that the 2,500 tonnes of scrap metal had impurities below 1% before the ship's voyage from St Petersburg in Russia to Greece late last year.