{"id":270218,"date":"2024-07-29T12:00:35","date_gmt":"2024-07-29T11:00:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=270218"},"modified":"2024-07-23T05:50:41","modified_gmt":"2024-07-23T04:50:41","slug":"dramatic-moment-anti-whaling-campaigner-paul-watson-ambushed-and-arrested","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2024\/07\/dramatic-moment-anti-whaling-campaigner-paul-watson-ambushed-and-arrested\/","title":{"rendered":"Dramatic Moment Anti-Whaling Campaigner Paul Watson \u2018Ambushed\u2019 and Arrested"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

It’s feared 73-year-old Watson will die in prison if he’s sent to Japan. Photo: Neptune’s Pirates<\/p><\/div>\n

Captain Paul Watson, the founder of Sea Shepherd, was arrested during a mission to block Japan’s controversial whaling program.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

22 Jul 2024 –<\/em> Anti-whaling campaigner Paul Watson has been \u201cambushed\u201d and arrested in Denmark on an international arrest warrant believed to have been issued by Japan.<\/p>\n

The Greenpeace co-founder and Sea Shepherd founder<\/a> was reportedly handcuffed and taken into custody by 14 police and SWAT team members after his ship made port in Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory. Pictures supplied to Yahoo News by Watson\u2019s latest venture Neptune\u2019s Pirates<\/a> and Captain Paul Watson Foundation show a stunned Watson being forced into a van on Sunday morning (local time).<\/p>\n

It\u2019s believed a Red Notice – an international arrest warrant – was issued for Captain Watson\u2019s previous anti-whaling campaign which targeted Japan\u2019s so-called scientific research program in the Antarctic region. Japan\u2019s program was declared illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2014, and it retreated to hunting in its own territorial waters.Fear Paul Watson could die in prison if sent to Japan<\/b><\/p>\n

Rob Read, the COO of Neptune\u2019s Pirates UK said Watson\u2019s supporters have been left in shock. It\u2019s feared 73-year-old Watson could die in jail if he\u2019s transported to Japan.<\/p>\n

\u201cPaul could face 15 years in prison, likely a life sentence for him. [It was] a total ambush by Japan using an unpublished Interpol warrant newly submitted in March this year,\u201d Read told Yahoo News via text message.<\/p>\n

Denmark allows its self-government archipelago the Faroe Islands to hunt whales and dolphins, which Neptune\u2019s Pirates has actively campaigned against. Read, who has spearheaded that campaign said as a European Nation, Denmark has an obligation to protect whales.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe arrest [was] organised with Denmark just as Paul was sailing to again oppose Japanese whaling,\u201d Read said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The reason Paul Watson was heading to Japan<\/b><\/p>\n

Watson had been on board his 72-metre flagship the M\/Y John Paul Dejoria, planning to intercept and block Japan\u2019s new factory whaling ship when he was arrested.<\/p>\n

The mission was announced after Japan revealed it had added another species to its kill list this year,<\/a> the fin whale, which is the second longest species after blue whales.<\/p>\n

Video shows police telling Watson’s fellow crew members, \u201cWe came here, and arrested Paul Watson due to an international arrest order from Japan\u201d.<\/p>\n

Neptune\u2019s Pirates said in a statement it has no means of contacting Watson.<\/p>\n

Locky MacLean, Ship Operation\u2019s Director for Captain Paul Watson Foundation, said the arrest left the crew \u201ccompletely shocked\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Red Notice had disappeared a few months ago. We were surprised because it could mean that it had been erased or made confidential. We understand now that Japan made it confidential to lure Paul into a false sense of security. We implore the Danish government to release Captain Watson and not entertain this politically-motivated request\u201d, he said in a statement.<\/p>\n

_______________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Captain Paul Watson is a Canadian-American marine conservation activist who founded the direct action group the <\/i>Sea Shepherd Conservation Society<\/i><\/span><\/a> in 1977 and was more recently featured in<\/i> Animal Planet\u2019s popular television series<\/i> \u201cWhale Wars\u201d and the documentary about his life, <\/i>\u201cWatson<\/span><\/a>.\u201d Sea Shepherd<\/i><\/span><\/a>\u2019s mission is to protect all ocean-dwelling marine life. Watson has authored or co-authored more than a dozen <\/i>books<\/i><\/span><\/a>, including<\/i> Death of a Whale<\/span><\/a> (2021),<\/i> Urgent!<\/span><\/a> (2021),<\/i> Orcapedia<\/span><\/a> (2020),<\/i> Dealing with Climate Change and Stress<\/span><\/a> (2020),<\/i> The Haunted Mariner<\/span><\/a> (2019), and<\/i> Captain Paul Watson: Interview with a Pirate<\/span><\/a> (2013).<\/i><\/p>\n

Go to Original – rsn.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

22 Jul 2024 – Anti-whaling campaigner, Greenpeace co-founder, and Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson has been reportedly \u201cambushed,\u201d handcuffed and arrested in Denmark by 14 police and SWAT on an international arrest warrant.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":270224,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[170],"tags":[619,401,179,1795,1796,3003,1715],"class_list":["post-270218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animal-rights-vegetarianism","tag-animal-rights","tag-environment","tag-japan","tag-paul-watson","tag-sea-shepherd","tag-violence-against-animals","tag-whales"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270218"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270218\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":270227,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270218\/revisions\/270227"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270224"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}