Faizan Hashmi
Published December 17, 2024 | 10:21 PM
Veteran anti-whaling campaigner Paul Watson, released from detention in Greenland after Denmark refused a Japanese extradition request, has spent decades battling harpoonists and seal hunters in high seas confrontations
Paris, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 17th Dec, 2024) Veteran anti-whaling campaigner Paul Watson, released from detention in Greenland after Denmark refused a Japanese extradition request, has spent decades battling harpoonists and seal hunters in high seas confrontations.
For years a bete noire of Japan, one of the last three countries along with Iceland and Norway to practise commercial whale hunting, Watson was arrested on July 21 in Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory.
His first comment on being released was that his five-month detention had brought attention to "illegal" Japanese whaling.
Watson was arrested on a Japanese "red notice" international warrant when his ship was on its way to "intercept" a new Japanese whaling factory vessel in the North Pacific, according to the CPWF.
Japan accuses Watson of injuring a Japanese crew member with a stink bomb intended to disrupt the whalers' activities during a Sea Shepherd clash with the Shonan Maru 2 vessel in 2010.
Jean Tamalet, a lawyer for Watson, told AFP that "the fight is not over.
"We will now have to challenge the red notice and the Japanese arrest warrant, to ensure that Captain Paul Watson can once again travel the world in complete peace of mind, and never experience a similar episode again," Tamalet said.
The 74-year-old American-Canadian has received the support of Brigitte Bardot, the French screen legend turned animal rights activist, who accused the Japanese government of launching "a global manhunt" against Watson.
France's President Emmanuel Macron also pressed Danish authorities not to extradite the campaigner, who has applied for French nationality.
Watson devoted himself to saving marine life in 1977, forming what would become the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. He was dismissed from the group in 2022 after infighting, which he said left a bitter taste. Some branches of the association, including in France, continue to support him.
Before then he had spent time with the Canadian Coast Guard and Norwegian and Swedish merchant marine ships.