Greenpeace has proof that Danish vessels were doing “systematic,” “intensive” and “continuous” illegal fishing within a protected area of the Kattegat that is closed for fishing. Sweden and Denmark jointly agreed and closed the Kattegat for all fisheries on January 2009. Both the nations have imposed limitations in three other areas to help protect the seriously threatened cod stocks in the region. But two Greenpeace activists claimed that it possess video evidence of three Danish vessels.
Greenpeace said that it had secretly installed monitoring equipment on six vessels measuring less than 15 metres from the Gilleje fishing port on Zealand’s northern tip. The European Union (EU) requires all vessels above that limit to carry Vessel Monitoring Systems (VMS) that let authorities supervise where the boats are fishing.
Five of those six ships, Greenpeace informed, were found to have ventured into the closed area, three of them were caught on video fishing illegally and two others were moving around systematically at very low speed — indicating that they were trawling.
The Swedish Board of Fisheries and the national Coast Guard corroborated that 20 Danish fishing vessels thus far have been caught in the act fishing in the no-fishing zone in under a year. Surprisingly, no cases have yet reached court. Denmark will decide on the possible revoking of licenses after Sweden’s legal process is completed.
Head of the Control Department in the Board of Fisheries Johan Löwenadler affirmed that no Swedish fishers have been caught fishing illegally. Sweden’s Agriculture and Fisheries Minister Eskil Erlandsson was “both disappointed and disgusted.”
