The detention of the Canadian anti-whaling vessel Farley Mowat in Cape Town harbour was being dealt with through “diplomatic channels”, according to spokesmen for the South African Department of Foreign Affairs and the Canadian High Commission in Pretoria, writes Jean Le May in Cape Town.
South African authorities detained the Farley Mowat on January 25 when it docked after returning from the Antarctic. The ship had been “ambushing Japanese whalers, hitting them and chasing them,” said a statement issued by the vessel’s owners, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Patrick Holloway, a Cape Town lawyer representing the owners, confirmed to World Fishing that the Farley Mowat’s captain, Paul Watson,
had returned to Canada
“for discussions”.
The South African Department of Transport served papers on the vessel saying that it appeared to
be “not in possession of an international ship security certificate or a ship
security plan.”
Captain Saleem Modak of the South African Maritime Safety Authority disclosed that the Canadian authorities had asked them to “check whether the crew were properly qualified and to check on safety issues. The vessel did not comply with safety regulations.”
However, the green lobby believes that the Canadian authorities asked the South Africans to act against the Farley Mowat under pressure from Japan, whose whaling fleet is catching 900 whales, ostensibly for scientific purposes, in the Antarctic during the southern summer. Fishing industry spokesmen have condemned the Farley Mowat’s activities as “dangerous and irresponsible seamanship in most inhospitable waters”.
Alex Cornelissen, former chief mate and now acting captain of the Farley Mowat, told World Fishing that the vessel was registered in Canada as a yacht and that that Canada did not issue security certificates for pleasure craft.
“The Japanese were
killing whales in the Antarctic Whale Sanctuary and nobody was stopping them,” he said. “Moreover, there is no enforcement of the laws against illegal, unregistered, unreported fishing in international waters. What we were doing was perfectly legal.”
Only the vessel was detained and the crew of
the Farley Mowat were “free to come and go as they please”, he said.
