Category: Global

Glob­al

Spring into action (though storms may be at the door) — the latest issue of the EF! Action Update has burst forth

Read all about occu­pa­tions & lock-ons of big indus­tri­al places around the world, cor­po­rate & gov­ern­ment block­ades, squat­ting, air­port inva­sions, sub­ver­tis­ing, cli­mate crim­i­nals locked & glued shut, trees climbed and chopped down, GM maize fields trashed, hunger strikes, bur­row­ing under fences, jump­ing on w

Rabbit under fenceRead all about occu­pa­tions & lock-ons of big indus­tri­al places around the world, cor­po­rate & gov­ern­ment block­ades, squat­ting, air­port inva­sions, sub­ver­tis­ing, cli­mate crim­i­nals locked & glued shut, trees climbed and chopped down, GM maize fields trashed, hunger strikes, bur­row­ing under fences, jump­ing on whal­ing boats, Buy­ing Noth­ing, Reclaim­ing the Streets and the unstop­pable singing of Christ­mas songs, not to men­tion skat­ing pen­guins. Even some upcom­ing dates to get stuck in or to meet oth­er direct action cra­zies. We could­n’t make it up even if we tried.

Anoth­er bumper issue, with a spe­cial insert on Agro­fu­els includ­ing a list of refiner­ies ‘in the pipeline’ or already on the ground, plus a legal update about the recent changes to your access to solic­i­tors in police sta­tions.

The lat­est issue of the Earth First! Action Update burst forth at the lat­est nation­al meet­ing of the Camp for Cli­mate Action (see climatecamp.org.uk for how the camp idea is auda­cious­ly mor­ph­ing this year).

Down­load it to print out and share here. Do get in touch with the edi­to­r­i­al col­lec­tive to let them know if you’re dish­ing it up round your way, or need paper copies, or want to give them one of the rar­er ingre­di­ents, dosh (to send it to pris­on­ers, protest camps and far beyond) — their con­tact details and more are here.

Teenager arrested after tying herself to Japananese Embassy

25.1.2008
A British teenag­er has been arrest­ed after tying her­self to a stair­case at the Japan­ese Embassy in Lon­don in a protest over whal­ing, she said. Sophie said last night: “I hon­est­ly think that me hav­ing a crim­i­nal record is not a big price to pay when what the whales are going through is so much worse.”

25.1.2008
A British teenag­er has been arrest­ed after tying her­self to a stair­case at the Japan­ese Embassy in Lon­don in a protest over whal­ing, she said. Sophie said last night: “I hon­est­ly think that me hav­ing a crim­i­nal record is not a big price to pay when what the whales are going through is so much worse.”

A British teenag­er has been arrest­ed after tying her­self to a stair­case at the Japan­ese Embassy in Lon­don in a protest over whal­ing, she said.

Sophie Wyness, 14, and her father Mar­tin attached them­selves to a stone stair­case inside the embassy lob­by with cable ties overnight, say­ing it was wrong to “bru­tal­ly mur­der” whales.

Sophie said last night: “I hon­est­ly think that me hav­ing a crim­i­nal record is not a big price to pay when what the whales are going through is so much worse.”

It is not the first time the 14-year-old, who has also cam­paigned against Aus­trali­a’s nuclear pol­i­cy, has been removed from a protest but it is the first time she has been arrest­ed.

She said: “I have just been released. We have been charged with crim­i­nal tres­pass and it will go before the Attor­ney Gen­er­al, not the CPS, because of the polit­i­cal impli­ca­tions.”

The teenag­er was inspired to take action after watch­ing a film about the Green­peace ves­sel Esper­an­za — which is cur­rent­ly dis­rupt­ing the activ­i­ties of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet in the South­ern Ocean.

One video clip last­ing 30 sec­onds, which showed a whale being blown up, had “hit me hard”, she explained ear­li­er.

The video pushed her to stage the hour-long protest because she felt it was wrong to wrong to “bru­tal­ly mur­der” whales.

“It’s a very impor­tant sub­ject at the moment. They’re such amaz­ing crea­tures and they deserve rights and love and a bit of respect,” she said.

“I have total respect for the Japan­ese peo­ple but not what they’re doing out there with the whales.”

She said tak­ing direct action was the only way to get atten­tion on the issue.

“Hope­ful­ly it’ll get put out there and show we’re not going to sit back and let them get away with it.”

Mr Wyness said he was only involved in the protest in order to sup­port his daugh­ter and spoke of his pride that she had been so res­olute in stand­ing up for her con­vic­tions.

He said: “I was real­ly only there as back up. This was Sophie’s day.”

He added: “I am extreme­ly proud of Sophie. She is an amaz­ing, amaz­ing young woman full or courage and deter­mi­na­tion and her con­vic­tions are very strong. This doc­u­men­tary gen­uine­ly moved her to the point where she want­ed to do some­thing about it.

Quotes tak­en from thelondonpaper.com

Tasmanian Forest Defenders ‘Lose Their Exclusion’ in the Styx Valley, Tasmania

It’s been a busy week for Tas­man­ian for­est defend­ers in the Styx Val­ley, set­ting up two block­ades in two days as part of the ‘Gunns and Doz­ers Lose Your Exclu­sion Tour’.

Styx exclusion tour action 1Styx exclusion tour action 2It’s been a busy week for Tas­man­ian for­est defend­ers in the Styx Val­ley, set­ting up two block­ades in two days as part of the ‘Gunns and Doz­ers Lose Your Exclu­sion Tour’.

Yes­ter­day’s work halt­ed con­struc­tion on a new log­ging road being pushed into pris­tine for­est near the Tas­man­ian Wilder­ness World Her­itage Area. Today, two dif­fer­ent access points to old growth log­ging coupe SX10F were block­ad­ed, effec­tive­ly stop­ping the destruc­tive log­ging of ancient for­est all day.

See the media releas­es below…
THURSDAY 24th JANUARY 2008

Tas­man­ian Activists High­light Destruc­tive Log­ging in the Styx Val­ley

Com­mu­ni­ty activists from Still Wild Still Threat­ened have halt­ed work on the con­struc­tion of a new log­ging road in the Styx Val­ley today as part of the “Gunns and Doz­ers Lose Your Exclu­sion Tour”. The “Gunns and Doz­ers Lose Your Exclu­sion Tour” is an aware­ness rais­ing event high­light­ing the ancient for­est destruc­tion occur­ring behind locked gates in Tasmania’s South­ern Forests. The road­ing oper­a­tion will open up more areas of the inter­na­tion­al­ly renowned Val­ley of the Giants for destruc­tive log­ging.

“Today’s action high­lights the community’s grave con­cerns with the alarm­ing rate at which Tasmania’s old growth and high con­ser­va­tion val­ue forests are being destroyed behind locked gates all over the state. The ancient forests of the Styx, Weld and Upper Flo­ren­tine Val­leys have been inter­na­tion­al­ly recog­nised as being of World Her­itage Val­ue and yet indus­tri­al activ­i­ty like log­ging and road­ing con­tin­ues every­day” said Still Wild Still Threat­ened Spokesper­son Jess Wright.

“Our ancient forests also play an essen­tial role in the mit­i­ga­tion of dan­ger­ous cli­mate change, soak­ing up and stor­ing car­bon diox­ide from the atmos­phere. At this crit­i­cal time in the inter­na­tion­al debate about the mas­sive con­tri­bu­tion of for­est degra­da­tion to cli­mate change, more road­ing into and log­ging of our car­bon stor­ing forests is the last thing our plan­et needs” said Jess Wright.

“How much longer will our lead­ers stay silent and let these cli­mate crimes con­tin­ue? We are call­ing on Sen­a­tor Pen­ny Wong, the Min­is­ter for Cli­mate Change and Water to show strong lead­er­ship on this issue and act imme­di­ate­ly to pro­tect Tasmania’s car­bon dense ancient forests” Jess Wright said.

FRIDAY 25th JANUARY

Tas­man­ian For­est Defend­ers ‘Lose Their Exclu­sion’ in the Styx Val­ley, Tas­ma­nia

Com­mu­ni­ty activists from Still Wild Still Threat­ened have returned to the Styx Val­ley today, pre­vent­ing the destruc­tion of ancient for­est in old growth log­ging coupe SX10F as part of the ‘Gunns and Doz­ers Lose Your Exclu­sion Tour’. The ‘Gunns and Doz­ers Lose Your Exclu­sion Tour’ is an aware­ness rais­ing event high­light­ing the ancient for­est destruc­tion occur­ring behind locked gates in South­ern Tasmania’s threat­ened forests. Today’s action comes after for­est defend­ers halt­ed con­struc­tion on a new log­ging road into pris­tine for­est near the Tas­man­ian Wilder­ness World Her­itage Area yes­ter­day.

“While the chain­saws and bull­doz­ers have been tear­ing apart this pris­tine tract of old growth for­est, the pub­lic has been denied access to one of the Styx Valley’s most pop­u­lar tourist attrac­tions, the ancient for­est walk known as ‘The Tolkien Track’. It is com­plete­ly unac­cept­able that not only is our unique nat­ur­al her­itage being lost for­ev­er but the pub­lic is miss­ing out on the oppor­tu­ni­ty to expe­ri­ence ancient for­est that isn’t being logged” said Still Wild Still Threat­ened spokesper­son Jess Wright.

“In this era of dan­ger­ous cli­mate change the destruc­tive log­ging of old growth for­est in the Styx Val­ley is tru­ly a glob­al issue. Stud­ies show that Euca­lyp­tus reg­nans forests, like those typ­i­cal of the Styx Val­ley can store up to 1200 tonnes of car­bon per hectare when ful­ly mature*. The log­ging of these ancient car­bon stores releas­es mas­sive amounts of green­house gas­es into the atmos­phere great­ly con­tribut­ing to cli­mate change.” said Jess Wright.

“Sen­a­tor Pen­ny Wong has to step up to her respon­si­bil­i­ty as the Min­is­ter for Cli­mate Change and act imme­di­ate­ly to pro­tect Tasmania’s car­bon stor­ing old forests. Pro­tect­ing Tasmania’s old growth and high con­ser­va­tion val­ue forests is an essen­tial step in the glob­al chal­lenge to mit­i­gate the effects of dan­ger­ous cli­mate change” Jess Wright said.

Two for­est defend­ers are perched high in tree sits attached to struc­tures block­ing both access points to the old growth log­ging coupe SX10F.

Tas­ma­ni­a’s South­ern Forests…Still Wild Still Threat­ened
The Huon Val­ley Envi­ron­ment Cen­tre
Cool Forests…Conservation cools the plan­et

Anti-LNG action at NW Natural, USA

Jan 23rd, 2008
Cas­ca­dia Ris­ing Tide joined forces with Stump­town Earth First! to hold an action and ral­ly at the down­town Port­land office of NW Nat­ur­al (local gas util­i­ty), for their involve­ment in Liq­ue­fied Nat­ur­al Gas (LNG) relat­ed pipelines, which threat­en to clear-cut strips of for­est through­out Ore­gon for new fos­sil fuel infra­struc­ture.

US LNG pipeline protest bannerJan 23rd, 2008
Cas­ca­dia Ris­ing Tide joined forces with Stump­town Earth First! to hold an action and ral­ly at the down­town Port­land office of NW Nat­ur­al (local gas util­i­ty), for their involve­ment in Liq­ue­fied Nat­ur­al Gas (LNG) relat­ed pipelines, which threat­en to clear-cut strips of for­est through­out Ore­gon for new fos­sil fuel infra­struc­ture.

Pil­ing dozens of trees on NW Natural’s down­town office entry­way, activists with Stump­town Earth First! and Cas­ca­dia Ris­ing Tide, sent a mes­sage to the LNG-invest­ed gas com­pa­ny: “There’s noth­ing Green about Clear-cuts, No new pipelines”.

“NW Nat­ur­al claims to be fight­ing cli­mate change, but all we see is new fos­sil fuel devel­op­ment projects knock­ing down trees and destroy­ing rivers,” says Paige Crown, a par­tic­i­pant in the ral­ly, “its com­mon sense that an impor­tant step in fight­ing cli­mate change is to pro­tect car­bon-absorb­ing trees and forests, not clear-cut them.”

The Palo­mar pipeline, Ore­gon LNG pipeline and the Pacif­ic Con­nec­tor, which total over 600 miles of pipe, threat­en to cross over 1000s streams, rivers and wet­lands and require wide clear-cut con­struc­tion cor­ri­dors through pub­lic lands, includ­ing road­less areas and old growth forests.

After com­ple­tion of the projects per­ma­nent right-of-way will be main­tained, which — in the case of heav­i­ly forest­ed areas—may cre­ate more fuel for wild­fires (which rep­re­sents even greater dan­ger in the event of a pipeline leak). The clear­ing of trees and brush in these areas may also con­tribute to ero­sion, impact­ing soil via­bil­i­ty and water qual­i­ty.

The Palo­mar pipeline project, pro­posed to con­nect NorthernStar’s Brad­wood Land­ing ter­mi­nal to the Tran­scana­da pipeline, is posi­tioned to snake over Mt. Hood. Map­ping avail­able from the Mt. Hood Nation­al For­est shows the pipeline would go through Late Suc­ces­sion­al Reserves for spot­ted owls and bor­der pro­posed Wilder­ness areas.

The Pacif­ic Con­nec­tor, attached to the Jor­dan Cove pro­pos­al in Coos Coun­ty demands a 95 ft. clear-cut con­struc­tion cor­ri­dor through Rogue Riv­er Nation­al For­est, Kla­math Nation­al For­est and Umpqua Nation­al For­est.

*This action was inspired by the NW Nat­ur­al ral­ly on Decem­ber 12, 2007, in which Cas­ca­dia Ris­ing Tide orga­nized with impact­ed com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers to bring hun­dreds of peo­ple to down­town Port­land bring­ing farm equip­ment and fish­ing boats, cre­at­ing a loud and col­or­ful “No LNG” coali­ton.

GM Trees Chopped Down in New Zealand

19.1.2008

Anti-GM pro­test­ers have cut down 19 genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied pine trees at a research site near Rotorua. The attack hap­pened at some stage over the week­end.


19.1.2008

Anti-GM pro­test­ers have cut down 19 genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied pine trees at a research site near Rotorua. The attack hap­pened at some stage over the week­end.

A 1.5 metre hole was found along the fence­line, made of 3.5 metre high elec­tri­fied wire. The crop destroy­ers are assumed to have bur­rowed through that hole before chop­ping down the trees, almost 1/4 of the 80 trees on the site.

Police found a spade with a “GE Free New Zealand” stick­er on it lean­ing up against the fence. No group has yet claimed respon­si­bil­i­ty for the attack.

The Rotorua site was the same one protest­ed against in 2005, where four peo­ple were arrest­ed, one of whom was also pep­per sprayed by Police. That protest was organ­ised by the Peo­ple’s Mora­to­ri­um Enforce­ment Agency, who have cel­e­brat­ed the week­end’s action.

“The destruc­tion of the GE trees in Rotorua high­lights the resis­tance to genet­ic engi­neer­ing in Aotearoa/New Zealand. Because ERMA is not stop­ping GE mate­r­i­al from being released into the envi­ron­ment, the peo­ple of Aotearoa have to inter­vene,” said PMEA spokesper­son Felic­i­ty Per­ry.

=====

On Mon­day, envi­ron­men­tal sabo­teurs cir­cum­vent­ed an elec­tri­fied secu­ri­ty fence by tun­nel­ing under­neath it, and chopped down 20 genet­i­cal­ly engi­neered trees.

Rotorua, New Zealand — Envi­ron­men­tal sabo­teurs appear to be respon­si­ble for the destruc­tion of field tri­al crop of genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied radi­a­ta pine and Nor­way spruce trees at the Crown Research Insti­tute Scion’s base. On Mon­day, van­dals cir­cum­vent­ed an elec­tri­fied secu­ri­ty fence by tun­nel­ing under­neath it, and chopped down 20 genet­i­cal­ly engi­neered trees.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10487121

A spade with a “GE Free New Zealand” stick­er was left behind, appar­ent­ly to make sure author­i­ties new why the night­time raid was car­ried out. Researchers will like­ly be forced to aban­don this par­tic­u­lar exper­i­ment since a full 20% of their trees were destroyed.

http://gefree.org.nz

Sea Shepherd Hostages Return Back to Steve Irwin — Lack of Cooperation May Kill the Whales

Japan­ese Poach­ers Release Sea Shep­herd Hostages
18/01/08 http://www.seashepherd.org

Ben­jamin Potts and Giles Lane were trans­ferred from the Yushin Maru No. 2 to the Aus­tralian Cus­toms ves­sel Ocean­ic Viking ear­ly in the morn­ing at 0200 Hours Mel­bourne time (1300 Hours GMT). The two men were trans­ferred to the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin at 0930 Hours Mel­bourne time (2030 Hours GMT).

Sea Shepherd hostages returnJapan­ese Poach­ers Release Sea Shep­herd Hostages
18/01/08 http://www.seashepherd.org

Ben­jamin Potts and Giles Lane were trans­ferred from the Yushin Maru No. 2 to the Aus­tralian Cus­toms ves­sel Ocean­ic Viking ear­ly in the morn­ing at 0200 Hours Mel­bourne time (1300 Hours GMT). The two men were trans­ferred to the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin at 0930 Hours Mel­bourne time (2030 Hours GMT).

Both men were hap­py to be reunit­ed with their ship­mates and eager to return to chas­ing the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet in the South­ern Oceans. Both men report­ed that although they were roughed up when they first board­ed the whal­ing ship, that they were treat­ed well dur­ing their time onboard. The only injury was a bruised wrist suf­fered by Giles Lane.

“It did not take long before the whalers real­ized that they made a huge pub­lic rela­tions mis­take in keep­ing us on their ship,” said Ben­jamin Potts. “We made it clear to them that Sea Shep­herd was com­mit­ted to stop­ping their ille­gal whal­ing activ­i­ties.”

“Although we appre­ci­ate the con­cern that peo­ple have expressed for our wel­fare, it is impor­tant to remem­ber that this is not about us.” said Giles Lane. “It’s about stop­ping this cru­el and ille­gal whale hunt. The treat­ment that we received was triv­ial in com­par­i­son to the suf­fer­ing that the whales expe­ri­ence at the hands of the Japan­ese whalers. They may have been rough with us but at least we were not har­pooned, elec­tro­cut­ed and muti­lat­ed. This is not about us, it’s about the whales.”

The Steve Irwin is con­tin­u­ing its pur­suit of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet. “This is the 8th day that whales have not been killed,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “Every day that we stop the whalers is a vic­to­ry. We will con­tin­ue to inter­vene, harass, block, and obstruct the whalers at every oppor­tu­ni­ty.”

The Steve Irwin is present­ly at 59 Degrees 46 Min­utes South and 85 Degrees 59 Min­utes East and on the tail of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet.
http://www.seashepherd.org/migaloo/video/2008–01-18_video_clip_05_Sea_Shepherd_crew_members_released_back_to_the_Steve_Irwin.wmv

=================

“With “allies” like the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment and Green­peace, it is becom­ing increas­ing dif­fi­cult to keep the Japan­ese fleet from killing whales,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “Aus­tralian Cus­toms delib­er­ate­ly led us away from the fleet and Green­peace is guard­ing the coor­di­nates like the crown jew­els to pre­vent us re-locat­ing the fleet.”

Lack of Coop­er­a­tion May Kill the Whales
From onboard the Steve Irwin in the South­ern Oceans (18/01/08)

The Aus­tralian Cus­toms and Fish­eries Patrol ves­sel Ocean­ic Viking has thrown the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin off the trail of the Japan­ese fleet.

After pick­ing up the two Sea Shep­herd crewmem­bers from the Yushin Maru No. 2 the Ocean­ic Viking noti­fied the Steve Irwin to head for a ren­dezvous point a few hours away.

This was unusu­al con­sid­er­ing that the Yushin Maru No. 2 was only about ten miles away at the time. The Steve Irwin was forced to stop tail­ing the Yushin Maru No. 2 to meet up with the Ocean­ic Viking. This allowed the whaler to head off in an unknown direc­tion to rejoin the fac­to­ry ship Nis­shin Maru.

After drop­ping off Ben­jamin Potts and Giles Lane, the Ocean­ic Viking head­ed off in a direc­tion away from the Japan­ese fleet. The fleet then appar­ent­ly changed course and has now been lost from Sea Shep­herd. Green­peace tag­ging along with the Nishin Maru has report­ed that the catch­er boats have met back up with the main fleet.

Although Sea Shep­herd has been relay­ing the posi­tion of the catch­er boats to the Green­peace ship Esper­an­za for the last three days, Green­peace refus­es rec­i­p­ro­cate and refus­es to reveal the present loca­tion of the fleet.

“With “allies” like the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment and Green­peace, it is becom­ing increas­ing dif­fi­cult to keep the Japan­ese fleet from killing whales,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “Aus­tralian Cus­toms delib­er­ate­ly led us away from the fleet and Green­peace is guard­ing the coor­di­nates like the crown jew­els to pre­vent us re-locat­ing the fleet.”

Com­pli­cat­ing the search is the fact that the Japan­ese have sent a new ship the Fukoyoshi No. 68 to shad­ow the Steve Irwin at all times. The ves­sel is not part of the whal­ing fleet. It’s a large Japan­ese drag trawler. It does not have any fish­ing gear onboard and seems to have more elec­tron­ic gear than nor­mal for a fish­ing ves­sel. This ship is appar­ent­ly report­ing the Steve Irwin’s posi­tion to the Japan­ese fleet.

Sea Shep­herd has shut down whal­ing for a week. Unless the Steve Irwin can find the fleet soon, the killing will begin again. The Ocean­ic Viking will take pic­tures of dying whales and Green­peace will hang ban­ners, take pic­tures and con­tin­ue on with their inef­fec­tive stunts. They will not stop the killing.

“If whales begin to die with­in the next few days, I will hold Green­peace and the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment respon­si­ble,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “They know we can stop the killing because whales don’t die when Sea Shep­herd arrives. By lead­ing us off the tail of the whalers and refus­ing to coop­er­ate on coor­di­nates they are delib­er­ate­ly help­ing the whalers to escape from Sea Shep­herd and to resume the slaugh­ter of the whales. I under­stand that Green­peace needs kill footage and images of “hero­ic eco-war­riors” buzzing about in inflat­a­bles but that does not stop the har­poons. Our very pres­ence will deter the Japan­ese from killing whales. Sea Shep­herd is the best weapon that Green­peace can use to stop the resump­tion of whal­ing. By with­hold­ing coop­er­a­tion they are con­tribut­ing to the death of the whales. If any whales are killed with­in the next week I will hold Green­peace respon­si­ble for their deaths because they have the pow­er to coop­er­ate with Sea Shep­herd to pre­vent the killing from con­tin­u­ing.”

The Steve Irwin is con­duct­ing heli­copter sur­veil­lance patrols to re-locate the whal­ing fleet. The fleet should be with­in two hun­dred miles of Sea Shep­herd.

http://seashepherd.org

Whalers Hand Activists Over To Australia’s Ship

17th Jan­u­ary: the activists — Aus­tralian Ben­jamin Potts, 28, and Briton Giles Lane, 35 — were detained Tues­day after board­ing the har­poon ship to protest Japan’s whal­ing pro­gramme. They were hand­ed over to Aus­tri­ali­a’s ‘Ocean Viking’ ear­li­er today.

Operation Migaloo (Sea Shepherd)
Steve Irwin Sea Shepherd boat & helicopter
17th Jan­u­ary: the activists — Aus­tralian Ben­jamin Potts, 28, and Briton Giles Lane, 35 — were detained Tues­day after board­ing the har­poon ship to protest Japan’s whal­ing pro­gramme. They were hand­ed over to Aus­tri­ali­a’s ‘Ocean Viking’ ear­li­er today.

A Japan­ese whal­ing ship late Thurs­day hand­ed over to an Aus­tralian cus­toms ves­sel two anti-whal­ing activists who climbed aboard two days ear­li­er, an offi­cial from Japan’s Fish­eries Agency said.

Aus­tralia sent the cus­toms ship, the Ocean­ic Viking, to the Japan­ese whal­ing ship in a bid to end the stand-off involv­ing the activists of the mil­i­tant Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety.

“Two Sea Shep­herd activists who intrud­ed onto the Yushin Maru No 2 and have been in cus­tody on the ship were hand­ed over to the Ocean­ic Viking char­tered by the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment,” Hidea­ki Oka­da, a whal­ing offi­cial at the Fish­eries Agency in Tokyo, told AFP ear­ly Fri­day.

More at http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gzy-7LzEluJCEYZWmJXa_MiYpOcQ and http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7193212.stm

Hope­ful­ly they will be returned back to Sea Shep­herd’s ‘Steve Irwin’ very soon, that is the plan.

Back to destroy­ing whal­ing…

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Sea Shepherd pirates
Antarc­tic Whale Defense Cam­paign
Oper­a­tion Miga­loo 07–08

For more details, see http://www.seashepherd.org/migaloo/index.html

Anti-whaling hostages — update & solidarity demo reports: Berlin, London, Barcelona, New York, Washington DC

17/1/2008
Sea Shep­herd Shuts Down Antarc­tic Whale Hunt
The Japan­ese hunt for endan­gered whales in the South­ern Oceans Whale Sanc­tu­ary has been shut down.

Yushin Maru 2 whaler17/1/2008
Sea Shep­herd Shuts Down Antarc­tic Whale Hunt
The Japan­ese hunt for endan­gered whales in the South­ern Oceans Whale Sanc­tu­ary has been shut down.

“All whal­ing activ­i­ties have come to a halt,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son from onboard the Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Society’s ship Steve Irwin. No whales have been killed since Jan­u­ary 11th. The Japan­ese whal­ing fleet has been denied a sol­id week of whal­ing activ­i­ty. Our task now is to make that two weeks and then three weeks.”

As long as the Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety and Green­peace keep the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet on the run, there will be no whal­ing activ­i­ty.

“I wish that Green­peace would be more coop­er­a­tive,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son. “How­ev­er we will con­tin­ue to feed them the coor­di­nates for the rest of the fleet as they tail the fac­to­ry ship Nis­shin Maru. If we can­not work with Green­peace direct­ly we will work with them indi­rect­ly. The strength of any move­ment is in diver­si­ty.”

Jan­u­ary 17th found the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin chas­ing the whal­ing sup­ply ves­sel Ori­en­tal Blue­bird and three oth­er whal­ing ships east­ward along the line of Lat­i­tude of Six­ty Degrees South near the Eighty Six Degree East line of lon­gi­tude. This is approx­i­mate­ly 2000 miles from Fre­man­tle, Aus­tralia.

The Japan­ese whalers con­tin­ue to hold Aus­tralian cit­i­zen Ben­jamin Potts 28 and Giles Lane 35 of Great Britain. The Japan­ese gov­ern­ment has ordered their release but the whalers are defy­ing that order and refus­ing to release their hostages until Sea Shep­herd agrees to their demands. One of the demands is for Sea Shep­herd to dis­con­tin­ue oppos­ing whal­ing activ­i­ties. Cap­tain Wat­son respond­ed by refus­ing to acknowl­edge their demands and demand­ing instead that the hostages be released with­out con­di­tions.

The Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin will con­tin­ue to pur­sue ille­gal Japan­ese whal­ing activ­i­ties for as long as pos­si­ble.

——

Aus­tralia to inter­cede in Safe Return of Sea Shep­herd activists

After two days being held hostage on the Yushin Maru No 2, two Sea Shep­herd anti-whal­ing activists may be returned with­in the next day to the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin by the autho­ri­sa­tion of the Aus­tralian Gov­ern­ment to use the Cus­toms and Fish­eries patrol ves­sel Ocean­ic Viking as an inter­me­di­ary.

Aus­tralian For­eign Affairs Min­is­ter Stephen Smith said “What is required now to trans­fer those two men is the agree­ment of the Japan­ese Gov­ern­ment, which we have, the agree­ment of the Aus­tralian Gov­ern­ment, which we have,” Mr Smith said. “We now need the full and com­plete coop­er­a­tion of the two ves­sels, the two cap­tains and the two men con­cerned.”

Sea Shep­herd were refus­ing to meet the con­di­tions stip­u­lat­ed by the Cap­tain of the Yashin Maru No 2 to stop inter­fer­ing with the whal­ing fleet oper­a­tions for the trans­fer of the two crew mem­bers, with Cap­tain Paul Wat­son say­ing on the ABC 7.30 report “I don’t acqui­esce to ter­ror­ist demands and that’s what that is. Hold­ing hostages and mak­ing demands is a ter­ror­ist tac­tic.”

Asked to jus­ti­fy two mem­bers of his crew board­ing anoth­er ves­sel with­out autho­ri­sa­tion, which the Japan­ese have accused as an act or ter­ror­ism or pira­cy, Paul Wat­son replied “You can run around the ocean jump­ing on poacher’s ves­sels. They’re tar­get­ing endan­gered species and whale sanc­tu­ar­ies, in vio­la­tion of a glob­al mora­to­ri­um. The Unit­ed Nations’ world char­ter of nature on sec­tion of imple­men­ta­tion under Sec­tion 21 E allows for non-gov­ern­ment organ­i­sa­tions to uphold inter­na­tion­al con­ser­va­tion law. So, we are autho­rised to do that. These are poach­ers, I’m try­ing to get that through to peo­ple. They are poach­ers.”

Sec­tion 21 E of the World Char­ter for Nature, passed by the Unit­ed Nations Gen­er­al Assem­bly in 1982, states that “States and, to the extent they are able, oth­er pub­lic author­i­ties, inter­na­tion­al orga­ni­za­tions, indi­vid­u­als, groups and cor­po­ra­tions shall .…(e) safe­guard and con­serve nature in areas beyond nation­al juris­dic­tion.”

Sec­tion 24 of the char­ter says that “Each per­son has a duty to act in accor­dance with the pro­vi­sions of the present Char­ter; act­ing indi­vid­u­al­ly, in asso­ci­a­tion with oth­ers or through par­tic­i­pa­tion in the polit­i­cal process, each per­son shall strive to ensure that the objec­tives and require­ments of the present Char­ter are met.”

Accord­ing to the Aus­tralian For­eign min­is­ter, Stephen Smith on the ABC 7.30 Report, “the only con­di­tions that will be imposed here are con­di­tions that will be imposed by the Aus­tralian author­i­ties and the ‘Ocean­ic Viking’, and those con­di­tions will go to the safe­ty and secu­ri­ty of this oper­a­tion.

It was report­ed by AAP that the trans­fer may take place in the next 24 hours. Accord­ing to Kim McCoy, the exec­u­tive direc­tor of the Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety, on board the Steve Irwin “We have just spo­ken very recent­ly with an agent on board the Ocean­ic Viking cus­toms ves­sel,” she said. “We have received offi­cial con­tact from them stat­ing that they’re just wait­ing for the Japan­ese to con­firm that they’re will­ing to accept those terms.”

“My under­stand­ing is that the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment is not going to impose any con­di­tions on us to stop harass­ing the whal­ing, because the whal­ing is ille­gal. The only con­di­tion that the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment wants to impose is the safe trans­fer, and of course we’re going to have to facil­i­tate a safe trans­fer, we don’t want to jeop­ar­dise any­one’s safe­ty dur­ing the trans­fer of Giles and Pottsy (Ben­jamin Potts) to our ship.

“Beyond that they’ve told us that there will be no addi­tion­al con­di­tions. In oth­er words, we are going to con­tin­ue inter­ven­ing against the ille­gal whal­ing activ­i­ty of the Japan­ese.” she said.

Cap­tain Paul Wat­son told Ali Moore from the ABC 7.30 Report “We’re not protest­ing their whal­ing oper­a­tions, we’re not protest­ing them. What we are doing is inter­fer­ing with ille­gal activ­i­ties. This is an inter­ven­tion­ist oper­a­tion not a protest organ­i­sa­tion.”

Sources:

* ABC 7.30 Report — Jan 17, 2008 — Govt con­sid­ers send­ing ‘Ocean­ic Viking’ to the res­cue
* ABC 7.30 Report — Jan 17, 2008 — Sea Shep­herd cap­tain reports from the high seas
* ABC News — Jan 17, 2008 — Sea Shep­herd will only accept ‘uncon­di­tion­al’ Govt help
* news.com.au, Jan 17, 2008 — Anti-whalers con­tact­ed over detainees
* Unit­ed Nations Gen­er­al Assem­by 1982 World Char­ter for Nature

Repost from report on Syd­ney Indy­media, that con­tains all source links.
http://sydney.indymedia.org.au/story/australia-intercedes-safe-return-sea-shepherd-activists

——
Sea Shep­herd Sol­i­dar­i­ty Protest at Japan­ese Embassy, Berlin

16.1.2008
Peo­ple went to put pres­sure on offi­cials at the Japan­ese Embassy at Hiroshi­mas­trasse in Berlin today. They hung ban­ners on the fences of the Embassy demand­ing the imme­di­ate and uncon­di­tion­al release of the two Sea Shep­herd crew mem­bers tak­en hostage on 15 Jan­u­ary by the Japan­ese
Whal­ing Fleet.

For updates, see www.seashepherd.org

——

Sea Shepherd Hostage London Solidarity Demo
Sea Shep­herd Hostage Lon­don Sol­i­dar­i­ty Demo
16/1/08

Fifty pick­et the Japan­ese embassy in Lon­don in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Sea Shep­herd hostages (see pre­vi­ous posts). The embassy staff were not hap­py. Ban­ners read ‘Free the Hostages’, ‘Stop the the Whale Slaugh­ter’ and ‘Defend the Wild’. The pick­et got a lot of media cov­er­age with mul­ti­ple TV crews includ­ing one from Japan.

Updates post­ed here and at www.seashepherd.org

——

Sea Shep­herd demo, Barcelona
17.1.2008
Demon­stra­tors today held a protest out­side the Japan­ese Con­sul in Barcelona, also deliv­er­ing a let­ter to the Gen­er­al Con­sul demand­ing the imme­di­ate release of two Sea Shep­herd crew mem­bers cur­rent­ly held hostage by Japan­ese whalers.

A group of Sea Shep­herd sup­port­ers demon­strat­ed out­side the Japan­ese Con­sulate in Barcelona today, to call for the imme­di­ate release of Giles Lane and Ben­jamin Potts, cur­rent­ly held hostage aboard a Japan­ese whal­ing ship.

Inside, two peo­ple deliv­ered a let­ter to the Con­sul con­demn­ing the hostage tak­ing and demand­ing Japan­ese inter­ven­tion. Out­side, 150 leaflets were hand­ed out to work­ers and passers­by.

The Mossos turned up but every­thing was qui­et. Sol­i­dar­i­ty to Sea Shep­herd!

—–

NYC Protest for Sea Shep­herd Hostages

17.01.2008
Activists braved the cold of New York City today to protest yes­ter­day’s kid­nap­ping of Giles Lane and Ben­jamin Potts by an ille­gal Japan­ese whal­ing ship. They were released ear­li­er today to the Ocean Viking (Aus­trali­a’s ship).

VIDEOS
Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xk1AKVRbR8I
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gb7IM9VNY48

Activists braved the cold of New York City today to protest yes­ter­day’s kid­nap­ping of Giles Lane and Ben­jamin Potts by an ille­gal Japan­ese whal­ing ship.

The duo are cur­rent­ly being held hostage on the ship, and demon­stra­tions and protests at Japan­ese embassies and con­sulates across the globe are being held in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Sea Shep­herd crew.

Japan, we demand you stop the bloody slaugh­ter of inno­cent whales and dol­phins and return the kid­napped activists IMMEDIATELY with­out harm!

http://www.war-online.org

—–

17/01/08

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iO2I38jBo‑E

Activists from NYC band­ed togeth­er with activists from Wash­ing­ton D.C. to protest the kid­nap­ping and hostage tak­ing of Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety mem­bers Giles Lane (UK) and Ben­jamin Potts (Aus­tralia).

Ani­mal lovers and envi­ron­men­tal­ists gath­ered out­side the Japan­ese embassy and demand­ed the release of Potts and Lane, who are regard­ed as heroes, and also demand­ed an end to the slaugh­ter of beau­ti­ful whales and dol­phins that go to feed Japan­ese bel­lies.

At the end of yes­ter­day’s protest activists received the call: The Sea Shep­herd heroes had just been released.

Indigenous Action Against Mining Hold Australian Firm At Bay in the Philippines

2008-01-17
NUEVA VIZCAYA, Philip­pines- Trib­al vil­lagers up north Luzon block­ad­ed the Aus­tralian min­ing com­pa­ny from fur­ther explor­ing min­er­als in their com­mu­ni­ty, Fri­day noon, and forced the min­ing firm to leave the vil­lage.

Rabbit under fence2008-01-17
NUEVA VIZCAYA, Philip­pines- Trib­al vil­lagers up north Luzon block­ad­ed the Aus­tralian min­ing com­pa­ny from fur­ther explor­ing min­er­als in their com­mu­ni­ty, Fri­day noon, and forced the min­ing firm to leave the vil­lage.

Accord­ing to reports, hun­dred dozens of indige­nous res­i­dents in Kasi­bu town ‚“pushed away employ­ees of a for­eign min­ing firm and their earth-mov­ing equip­ment that were sup­posed to start explo­ration in their com­mu­ni­ty”, said Inq.Net. The action held by local peo­ple has lead to an indef­i­nite oper­a­tion shut down of OceanaGold Philip­pines Inc.- an Aus­tralian com­pa­ny.

Indige­nous res­i­dents were only pro­tect­ing the Papaya water­shed that feed the Alimudin, Mal­ong and Pah­d­u­an rivers. These are the main sources of irri­ga­tion for about 150,000 fruit trees in Mal­abing Val­ley, which has six vil­lages. But the min­ing firm came in with­out con­sent among the vil­lagers and threat­en their means of exis­tence.

This is what the Aus­tralian Min­ing Com­pa­ny has said in their media release:
“OceanaGold offi­cials insist they no longer need proof of con­sent from the com­mu­ni­ty since they have a Finan­cial and Tech­ni­cal Assis­tance Agree­ment (FTAA) grant­ed by the gov­ern­ment in 1994 to Cli­max Min­ing Ltd.”

Japanese whalers take Sea Shepherds hostage (incl. Brit) — demo, L’don, 16 January; email addresses; release demands; videos

15.01.2008 — [lat­est update at bot­tom]
In what has been an unpre­dictably dra­mat­ic day for the cam­paign against whal­ing in Antarc­ti­ca, the crew of a Japan­ese har­poon gun­boat have seized Aus­tralian and British crew mebers of the Sea Shep­herd ves­sel, Steve Irwin.

Sea Shepherd Hostages15.01.2008 — [lat­est update at bot­tom]
In what has been an unpre­dictably dra­mat­ic day for the cam­paign against whal­ing in Antarc­ti­ca, the crew of a Japan­ese har­poon gun­boat have seized Aus­tralian and British crew mebers of the Sea Shep­herd ves­sel, Steve Irwin.

Astound­ing! Last year around this time, things were real­ly get­ting dra­mat­ic in the Sea Shep­herd pur­suit of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet across Antarc­ti­ca. Crew miss­ing at sea, ship­board fires, the risk of a pris­tine envi­ron­ment being chem­i­cal­ly dec­i­mat­ed, and even one human death as an accom­pa­ni­ment to the slaugh­ter of hun­dreds of mam­moth sen­tient beings.

Not to be out­done, the 2007/08 sea­son of resis­tance has just kicked into over­drive. Today, the Aus­tralian Fed­er­al Court called Japan­ese whal­ing — in Aus­tralian waters, at least — what it is: ille­gal. The Hon­ourable Jus­tice All­sop issued an injunc­tion order­ing that all Japan­ese whal­ing with­in Aus­tralian Antarc­tic waters (which Japan and most oth­er coun­tries don’t rec­og­nize) stop imme­di­ate­ly. So, tech­ni­cal­ly, since about 3pm Aus­tralian East Coast time every sin­gle crew mem­ber of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet has been eli­gi­ble for arrest should they enter Aus­tralian ter­ri­to­ries.

But the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet, as always, need­ed to up the ante. In the last 50 min­utes it has been report­ed that the crew of the har­poon gun­boat Yashin Maru II have tak­en two Sea Shep­herd activists — Aus­tralian Ben­jamin Potts and a Briton, Giles Lane — hostage, and tied them to the radar mast of their ship. Ear­li­er today the Sea Shep­herd ves­sel Steve Irwin broke off its pur­suit of the whale-pro­cess­ing fac­to­ry ves­sel, also known as the Cetacean Death Star, the Nis­shin Maru. With Green­peace’s Esper­an­za still pur­su­ing the fac­to­ry ship away from the rest of the whal­ing fleet, the Shep­herds turned about to dis­rupt the activ­i­ties of the rest of the scat­tered fleet.

Obvi­ous­ly, they found them alright. Shep­herd Cap­tain Paul Wat­son reports that the two men, who have now been effec­tive­ly kid­napped on the high seas — iron­i­cal­ly, a gen­uine act of pira­cy by the Japan­ese whalers — had board­ed the ship to deliv­er a let­ter to the cap­tain pro­claim­ing their whal­ing activ­i­ty ille­gal and demand­ing an imme­di­ate ces­sa­tion of whale-hunt­ing, as per the order made today by the Fed­er­al Court.

Seems that Aus­tralian con­cerns about cre­at­ing a diplo­mat­ic inci­dent with Japan pale in com­par­i­son to what the whal­ing fleet are clear­ly eager to cre­ate.

Stay tuned.

============

The Japan­ese har­poon ves­sel Yushin Maru No. 2 has tak­en two Sea Shep­herd vol­un­teer crew mem­bers hostage. Ben­jamin Potts 28, an Aus­tralian cit­i­zen and Giles Lane, 35, a cit­i­zen of Great Britain are being held hostage onboard the whal­ing ves­sel. Both men were assault­ed and then tied to the rail­ings of the whaler. They were then moved and tied to the radar mast by the whalers.

Japan­ese Whal­ing Fleet On the Run With Two Sea Shep­herd Hostages

The Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety’s ship Steve Irwin is in full pur­suit of five ves­sels of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet includ­ing the Japan­ese sup­ply ves­sel Ori­en­tal Blue­bird.

Both men board­ed the Yushin Maru to deliv­er a mes­sage to the Japan­ese cap­tain that the whalers were in vio­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al con­ser­va­tion law by tar­get­ing endan­gered species in an estab­lished whale sanc­tu­ary in vio­la­tion of a glob­al mora­to­ri­um on com­mer­cial whal­ing. They also noti­fied the cap­tain that Aus­tralia had just passed a court rul­ing bar­ring Japan­ese whalers from the Aus­tralian Antarc­tic Eco­nom­ic Exclu­sion Zone.

All of this activ­i­ty has tak­en place in the area of 60 Degrees South and 78 Degrees East. All activ­i­ty has been doc­u­ment­ed from the Sea Shep­herd heli­copter and the fast mov­ing Delta ves­sel. The Steve Irwin has dis­patched a small fast Delta boat and a heli­copter to attempt to per­suade the Yushin Maru No. 2 to stop and release the hostages.

Cap­tain Paul Wat­son has noti­fied the Aus­tralian Fed­er­al Police that he would like to see kid­nap­ping charges brought against the Japan­ese whalers. The Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment and the British Embassy have been informed that their cit­i­zens are being held hostage on an ille­gal­ly oper­at­ed Japan­ese whal­ing ship in Inter­na­tion­al waters.

The Japan­ese fac­to­ry ship Nis­shin Maru has fled over 700 miles to the North­west and is head­ing towards South Africa accom­pa­nied by the Green­peace ship Esper­an­za. The entire whal­ing fleet is on the run and out­side of the whal­ing area with the Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin in hot pur­suit of five ves­sels of the Japan­ese fleet.

No whales have been slaugh­tered for the last four days and it does not look as if the whal­ing oper­a­tions are going to begin again for anoth­er week at least, and not at all if the ves­sels are pre­vent­ed from regroup­ing. The Sea Shep­herd ship Steve Irwin has a good sup­ply of fuel and can remain in the area for some time and will con­tin­ue to police the ille­gal whal­ing oper­a­tions by the Japan­ese fleet.

Sea Shep­herd cap­tain Paul Wat­son will turn over author­i­ty to the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment to enforce the court rul­ing against ille­gal whal­ing in the Aus­tralian Antarc­tic Eco­nom­ic Exclu­sion Zone upon request from the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment and an agree­ment that Aus­tralia will enforce the court’s rul­ing to bar all Japan­ese whal­ing activ­i­ties in the Aus­tralian Antarc­tic Ter­ri­to­ry.

The let­ter tak­en aboard:

To: The Cap­tain of any Japan­ese ship involved with poach­ing oper­a­tions in The Aus­tralian Antarc­tic Ter­ri­to­r­i­al Eco­nom­ic Exclu­sion Zone.

Sir,

My name is Giles David Lane

I am a British cit­i­zen and an unpaid vol­un­teer on the Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety ves­sel Steve Irwin

I have come onboard your ship because you have refused to acknowl­edge com­mu­ni­ca­tion from our ship per­tain­ing to your ille­gal activ­i­ties in the waters of the Aus­tralian Antarc­tic Ter­ri­to­r­i­al Eco­nom­ic Exclu­sion Zone.

I am not board­ing your ship with the intent to com­mit a crime, to rob you or to inflict injury upon your crew and your­self or dam­age to your ship. My rea­son for board­ing is to deliv­er the mes­sage that you are in vio­la­tion of inter­na­tion­al con­ser­va­tion law and in vio­la­tion of the laws of Aus­tralia. It is my intent to deliv­er this mes­sage and then to request that you allow me to dis­em­bark from your ves­sel with­out harm or seizure.

I am empow­ered to act to uphold these laws in accor­dance with the Unit­ed Nations World Char­ter for Nature and the laws of Aus­tralia.

I am board­ing you with the request that you please refrain from any fur­ther crim­i­nal activ­i­ty in these waters and cease and desist with the con­tin­ued killing of endan­gered whales in this des­ig­nat­ed Whale Sanc­tu­ary in vio­la­tion of the IWC glob­al mora­to­ri­um on com­mer­cial whal­ing and that you cease and desist in con­tin­ued vio­la­tions of Aus­tralian law by killing whales with­in the ter­ri­to­r­i­al waters of Aus­tralia with­out per­mit or per­mis­sion from the gov­ern­ment of Aus­tralia.

I am board­ing you on the orders of Cap­tain Paul Wat­son who requests that you treat me with respect and in accor­dance with the Gene­va Con­ven­tion.

http://www.seashepherd.org/

============

Pick­et at 2.15pm 16/1/08 at Japan­ese Embassy, Lon­don. Near­est Tubes Green Park & Hyde Park Cor­ner.

The address is:101–104 Pic­cadil­ly, Lon­don, W1J 7JT
============

It would be great if every­one could take a moment to email the Japan­ese embassy and For­eign office and ask them to do what­ev­er they can to effect Giles’ release. Japan­ese Embassy: info@jpembassy.org.uk

For­eign and Com­mon­wealth Office: It would be good to copy them in to what­ev­er you send to the Embassy. I had some trou­ble get­ting hold of an email address, but you could try the fol­low­ing one — msu.publicin@fco.gov.uk; Meg Munn is the Min­is­ter “respon­si­ble” for Asia and the Pacific.meg.munn@fco.gov.uk or munnm@parliament.uk
020 7008 1500

Sug­ges­tion of what to write: Dear Japan­ese Ambassador,I am writ­ing to you to protest in the strongest pos­si­ble terms the tak­ing of two hostages on board a Japan­ese Whal­ing Ship this morning.Press reports (see links below) have sug­gest­ed that the two men, (one of whom is a UK Nation­al by the name of Giles Lane), who peace­ful­ly board­ed the Yushin Maru No. 2 to deliv­er a let­ter, were assault­ed and then tied up. Pho­tographs from their own ves­sel, the Sea Shep­herd, show the two men being tied up out­side. The inci­dent hap­pened sev­er­al hours ago and I am great­ly con­cerned for their safety.I demand that you inter­vene at once to ensure that these men are released, pro­tect­ed from the ele­ments, and returned safe­ly to their ves­sel as soon as pos­si­ble. I also hope that your gov­ern­ment will ensure that the cap­tain and crew of the Yushin Maru No. 2 be pros­e­cut­ed for their actions.Yours sin­cere­ly, etc

============

16/1/2008

Japan­ese Whalers Make Demands for Return of Hostages

The Insti­tute of Cetacean Research, the front group for the ille­gal Japan­ese whal­ing oper­a­tions are mak­ing demands for the release of the two Sea Shep­herd crew being held hostage onboard the Japan­ese whal­ing ves­sel Yushin Maru No. 2.

The whalers said they will return the hostages in return for Sea Shep­herd agree­ing to no longer inter­fere with their whal­ing oper­a­tions.

“The Insti­tute of Cetacean Research is act­ing like a ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion,” said Steve Irwin’s 1st Offi­cer Peter Brown. “Here they are tak­ing hostages and mak­ing demands. Our pol­i­cy is that we don’t respond to ter­ror­ist demands.”

The Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety has heard reports from the media that Japan has agreed to release the hostages but the Steve Irwin has not heard any­thing offi­cial from either the Aus­tralian or Japan­ese gov­ern­ments.

“The activ­i­ties of the Japan­ese whal­ing fleet are ille­gal under inter­na­tion­al con­ser­va­tion law. The Japan­ese are poach­ers and should be treat­ed in the same man­ner as ele­phant or tiger poach­ers,” said Cap­tain Paul Wat­son.

The Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Soci­ety will not nego­ti­ate with poach­ers and demands that the Japan­ese whalers release Ben­jamin Potts and Giles Lane as soon as pos­si­ble.

The loca­tion of the Yushin Maru No. 2 with the hostages onboard is not known present­ly. The ves­sel is no longer in sight or with­in radar range of the Steve Irwin.

============

BBC video of ship being board­ed

Col­lec­tion of dif­fer­ent videos