Anti-whaling activist arrested in Greenland; police threaten extradition to Japan

FILE – Paul Watson, then-founder and president of the animal rights and environmental organization Sea Shepherd Conservation, takes part in a demonstration against the Costa Rican government near the German president’s residence during a visit by the Costa Rican president to Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, May 23, 2012. Greenland police said they arrested Watson on Sunday, July 21, 2024, on an international arrest warrant from Japan. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, File)

BERLIN (AP) — Greenland police said they arrested a veteran environmental and anti-whaling activist on Sunday based on an international arrest warrant issued by Japan.

Paul Watson was arrested when his ship docked in Nuuk, the capital of Greenland, a police statement said. He will be brought before a district court with a request to be held in custody pending a decision on his possible extradition to Japan, the statement said.

The Captain Paul Watson Foundation said more than a dozen police officers boarded the ship and led Watson away in handcuffs when it stopped to refuel. The foundation said the ship was heading to the North Pacific with 25 volunteer crew members to intercept a new Japanese whaling ship.

“The arrest is believed to be related to an earlier Red Notice issued because of Captain Watson’s previous anti-whaling operations in the Antarctic,” the foundation said in an emailed statement.

“We implore the Danish government to release Captain Watson and not to comply with this politically motivated request,” Locky MacLean, director of the foundation, said in the statement.

Greenland is an autonomous region of Denmark.

Watson, a 73-year-old Canadian-American, is a former chairman of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. His direct action tactics, which include confrontations with whaling ships on the high seas, have earned him celebrity endorsements and he has appeared on the reality TV series “Whale Wars.”

However, it has also brought him into conflict with the authorities. He was arrested in Germany in 2012 on an extradition warrant from Costa Rica, but skipped bail after learning that Japan was also seeking his extradition because it accused him of endangering the lives of whalers during operations in the Southern Ocean. Since then, he has lived in countries such as France and the United States.

Watson, who left Sea Shepherd in 2022 to start his own organization, was also a leading member of Greenpeace, but left the organization in 1977 due to disagreements over its aggressive tactics.

According to his foundation, Watson’s current ship, the M/Y John Paul DeJoria, was scheduled to sail through the Northwest Passage to the North Pacific to confront a newly built Japanese whaling ship, “a murderous enemy without compassion or empathy, hell-bent on destroying the most intelligent, self-aware and sentient creatures in the sea.”