Raül Romeva i Rueda

Diumenge comença la temporada de pesca de Tonyina Vermella, però personalment demano (un cop més) aturar la pesca, i enguany amb una raó afegida: Líbia. A continuació adjunto la carta que acabo d’enviar a la Comissària Damanaki demanant-li que la Comissió Europea lideri el tancament.

Re: Bluefin tuna fishery and the Libyan crisis

Dear Commissioner

Over the past few months, I have been watching events unfold in Libya with horror, and sincerely hope that the crisis is resolved quickly and as peacefuly as possible.

In recent days, a new element has emerged as a consequence of those developments, though, that is also of great concern. That is the bluefin tuna fishery. The current crisis and prolonged military activity mean that Libya is no longer in a position to fulfil its responsibilities as a CPC in ICCAT, a fact reflected by the failure of the Compliance Committee of ICCAT to approve the Libyan fishing plan for 2011. As a consequence, all fish caught by Libyan vessels will be IUU fish. Further, given the complicated structure of the bluefin tuna fishery in terms of vessel ownership, transshipments etc., as well as the concentration of fishing effort in Libyan waters and the fact that Libya has no farms of its own, it will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to verify the legality of much of the tuna that will be caught this year. In short, I fear that the bluefin tuna recovery plan for 2011 is seriously compromised and will probably be a complete failure.

I feel that the EU should do its utmost to minimise the threat to the recovery of bluefin tuna in this situation.

The best solution would be for ICCAT CPCs to close the bluefin tuna fishery for 2011. Such an action would be completely justified given the impossibility of controlling fishing operations in a significant part of the most important fishing waters and thus the legality of the bluefin tuna that is caught. A closure for 2011 would also have the added benefit on increasing the probability of recovery of the stock from its current depleted status. I understand that this is a multilateral forum though and this would be difficult.

The EU has major responsibilities for the bluefing tuna stock, given its role as flag State, market State, port State, farm State, coastal State and State of beneficial ownership, all of which are clearly defined in the EU’s control regulation and IUU regulation.

There are a number of actions that the EU could take with respect to its own involvement in the fishery, before any action is taken by ICCAT.

Personally, I feel that the EU should simply close its own purse seine fishery for 2011, given the situation outlined above and the inevitable difficulties in verifying the catch certificates. I am very aware that this would be a politically very difficult decision.

At the very least, though, there are a number of very specific, fully justified decisions that the EU could take. These include:

• prohibition for any EU-flagged vessel to enter Libyan waters or, preferably, waters within a radius of the outer limit of the Libyan zone;
• closure of all EU ports to Libyan-flagged vessels (fishing, tug);
• prohibition for all EU farms or EU tugboats to accept bluefin tuna from any Libyan-flagged vessel;
• prohibition for all EU farms or EU tugboats to accept bluefin tuna from any tug that has entered Libyan waters, as shown by its VMS records;
• refusal to allow Libyan-flagged vessels from leaving any EU port (France has reportedly done this so far, whereas Malta allowed the Libyan fleet to leave Valletta);
• prohibition on receiving, via any third-country vessel, any bluefin tuna that has come from Libyan waters or Libyan fishing vessels as determined by the BCD.

In my view, these are the absolute minimum steps that the Commission should take, and would be fully justified in taking, in an attempt to reduce IUU fishing on this stock.

Yours sincerely,

Raül Romeva i Rueda