Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson arrested in Nuuk

Following the arrest of an international activist who strongly opposes whaling, it was an eventful weekend in the capital of Greenland.

Captain Paul Watson was arrested by a dozen police officers in the port of Nuuk, Greenland, on Sunday, July 21.

The 73-year-old environmental activist, who is known for his anti-whaling stance, made a statement on board the John Paul Dejoriaa 34-meter-long, ice-strengthened former U.S. Coast Guard vessel with a crew of 23.

In handcuffs, he is reportedly facing a first charge related to the “Bloody Fjords” intervention in Faroese waters in 2023. Like Greenland, the Faroe Islands are a constituent state of the Kingdom of Denmark.

For Paul Watson, it was an “aggressive, non-violent” action to protect pilot whales. In 2022, Sea Shepherd’s iconic founder was forced to leave the organization and establish the Captain Paul Watson Foundation to once again protect the oceans from illegal operations to exploit marine life.

However, there is a second motive for the arrest. The activist had been on Interpol’s Red Notice list since 2012. Japan had requested an arrest warrant after violent clashes between whalers and Sea Shepherd activists in the Southern Ocean in 2010.

“The report had recently disappeared from the Interpol website,” says Sea Shepherd France on X, a fact we observed, “so Paul Watson and his lawyers believed he was now free to move.”

The John Paul Dejoria was on his way to the Northwest Pacific to hinder Japanese whaling. It is possible that the court in Sermersooq and the Greenlandic Ministry of Justice will decide to extradite Paul Watson to Japan.

Camille Lin, Polar Journal AG

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