attempt to arrest whalers — Sea Shepherd captain abducted — crocodile assault

Feb­ru­ary 15 2010
Cap­tain Pete Bethune Boards Shonan Maru 2 to Arrest Japan­ese Skip­per

At 0629 Hours (Perth Time), New Zealand Cap­tain Pete Bethune of the recent­ly sunk Sea Shep­herd ves­sel Ady Gil breached the Japan­ese gov­ern­ment secu­ri­ty ship Shonan Maru 2 and suc­cess­ful­ly board­ed the ves­sel under cov­er of dark­ness.

His mis­sion is to attempt a citizen’s arrest of the skip­per of the Shonan Maru 2 for the destruc­tion of the Ady Gil and attempt­ed mur­der of the six Ady Gil crewmem­bers.

At 0600 Hours, Cap­tain Bethune (of New Zealand) left the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin on a Jet Ski dri­ven Lar­ry Rout­ledge (of Great Britain).

The Jet Ski lay in wait for the Shonan Maru 2 to approach. With the Japan­ese ves­sel mak­ing 14 knots through the water, Rout­ledge maneu­vered the Jet Ski into posi­tion under the anti-board­ing spikes along the port side of the Shonan Maru 2.

Cap­tain Bethune made the jump and climbed onboard the whal­ing ship with­out being noticed. Cap­tain Bethune is present­ly onboard the Shonan Maru 2 await­ing sun­rise to make his pres­ence known.

Cap­tain Bethune also has a bill for $3 mil­lion dol­lars to present to the Mas­ter of the Shonan Maru 2. The bill is for the cost of replac­ing the Ady Gil.

Cap­tain Bethune will be demand­ing that the Shonan Maru 2 Cap­tain sur­ren­der him­self to Sea Shep­herd or take his ship to the near­est Aus­tralian or New Zealand port to turn him­self in to legal author­i­ties.

Cap­tain Bethune will make it clear that he does not wish to return to a Sea Shep­herd ship with­out the Cap­tain of the Shonan Maru 2.

Sea Shep­herd antic­i­pates that the Japan­ese will hold Cap­tain Bethune as pris­on­er onboard the Shonan Maru 2.

“This was an impos­si­ble mis­sion,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “Cap­tain Bethune board­ed a Japan­ese whal­ing fleet secu­ri­ty ship at high speed in total dark­ness, breached the spikes and anti-board­ing nets and is present­ly onboard and the Japan­ese crew are still not aware that he is there. He is there to demand jus­tice for the sink­ing of his ship.”

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Japan Takes A Pris­on­er In their Cru­sade to Plun­der the South­ern Ocean Whale Sanc­tu­ary

The Japan­ese gov­ern­ment has said they will have Cap­tain Peter Bethune of New Zealand tak­en to Japan to be tried on unknown charges in a Japan­ese court.

The Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety and Cap­tain Peter Bethune were pre­pared for this pos­si­bil­i­ty pri­or to the board­ing of the Shonan Maru #2 by Cap­tain Bethune.

“Cap­tain Peter Bethune’s $3 mil­lion dol­lar ves­sel the Ady Gil was rammed, sunk and destroyed by the Cap­tain of the Shonan Maru #2. The inci­dent injured one of the six crewmem­bers and could have killed all six,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son, “Cap­tain Bethune was entire­ly in his rights to con­front the man who almost killed him and destroyed his ship. And now this same Japan­ese cap­tain who destroyed a ship almost killing its crew is intent on bring­ing Cap­tain Bethune back to Japan as his cap­tive. The ques­tion must be asked — who are the pirates here?”

The Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety sees this as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to ral­ly sup­port for Cap­tain Peter Bethune in New Zealand and Aus­tralia. These Japan­ese poach­ers plun­der the South­ern Ocean Whale Sanc­tu­ary with impuni­ty and now they are haul­ing a coura­geous Kiwi hero to the Land of the Ris­ing Sun to cru­ci­fy him for defend­ing the whales.

Cap­tain Peter Bethune is no longer just a man who set a world record in boat­ing and had the courage to defend the whales. He will now be the very sym­bol of the cit­i­zens of New Zealand and Aus­tralia and their love for the great whales.

The last time a Kiwi was tak­en pris­on­er to Japan was in their great war of impe­ri­al­ism when they attempt­ed to enslave both Aus­tralia and New Zealand. They have now returned to plun­der Aus­tralian and New Zealand waters and once again they are arro­gant­ly flaunt­ing the law and tak­ing pris­on­ers.

“I don’t think that Aus­tralian and New Zealan­ders are going to tol­er­ate the abuse of Peter Bethune by the thugs from Japan who annu­al­ly plun­der the South­ern Ocean Whale Sanc­tu­ary for prof­it in the name of research,” said Steve Irwin Chief Cook Lau­ra Dakin of Can­ber­ra.

“If the Japan­ese put Peter Bethune on tri­al in Japan, it will be a case that will draw the atten­tion of the world,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son, “What is the Japan­ese gov­ern­ment think­ing? The per­se­cu­tion of Cap­tain Peter Bethune will a ral­ly­ing point for an inter­na­tion­al cam­paign to free Cap­tain Bethune and to end the bru­tal ille­gal slaugh­ter of the whales in the South­ern Ocean Whale Sanc­tu­ary.

—

Steve Irwin Launch­es Croc Assault on the Japan­ese Whal­ing Fleet

Crikey! And now for some­thing com­plete­ly dif­fer­ent.

The Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety always likes to inject a lit­tle humor into our cam­paigns and today we decid­ed to do just that.

As a trib­ute to the late and leg­endary Steve Irwin for whom the Sea Shep­herd flag­ship is named, the crew of the Steve Irwin deliv­ered dozens of croc­o­dile eggs onto the flens­ing deck of the Nis­shin Maru.

Each of these eggs was spon­sored by Sea Shep­herd sup­port­ers on shore who paid $50 to inscribe a mes­sage on the out­side of the egg. When these eggs make con­tact with water, a baby croc­o­dile emerges from the egg and expands rapid­ly.

A few of the eggs were signed with mes­sages from Ter­ri, Bin­di and Robert Irwin.

“I can­not think of any­thing more appro­pri­ate for the Steve Irwin to toss onto the bloody flens­ing decks of the Nis­shin Maru than croc­o­dile eggs and baby crocs.” Said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son.

Of course these baby crocs and their eggs are not real. We can just see the Japan­ese try­ing to accuse Sea Shep­herd of cru­el­ty to ani­mals for this action and they prob­a­bly will since they can’t seem to tell the dif­fer­ence between fact and fic­tion.

“Before his trag­ic death Steve want­ed to join us in our efforts to defend the whales in the South­ern Ocean Whale Sanc­tu­ary,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “Because of that, we asked Ter­ri Irwin for per­mis­sion to name our ship in his hon­our.”

The croc deliv­ery went very well. Japan­ese water can­nons pro­vid­ed the mois­ture to crack the eggs and to release the expand­ing crocs onto the deck of the Nis­shin Maru.

“Steve would have loved this,” said 3rd Offi­cer Vin­cent Hayes of Williamstown, Vic­to­ria.

So down here in the South­ern Ocean today — Crocs rule!

We love you Steve!