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Fishing boats "Lian Run 24" and "Lian Run 29" illegally transfer boxes of frozen fish onto the "Binar 4" Cargo ship.
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Working with the Environmental Justice Foundation, we have been
patrolling and documenting the activities of fishing boats in the
waters surrounding Guinea Conakry. What we've found is certainly
confusing, and that's just the way the pirates want it to be.
"In the past few weeks we have begun to unravel the web of deceit around pirate fishing," said campaigner Sarah Duthie, from on board the Esperanza. "The way the legal and illegal ships work together is designed to deceive, but in the end it is a simple case of stealing food from others."
We found the Binar 4 being loaded with fish boxes from two Chinese fishing vessels - Lian Run 24 and Lian Run 27. Two more, the Lian Run 28 and Lian Run 29 were standing by, waiting to unload their catch.
All four trawlers have been fishing in Guinea - so transferring their catch (transshipping) in international waters is illegal. The only place wheretransshipping of Guinean-caught fish is legal is in the port of Conakry. Allfour of these Lian Run boats are licensed to fish in the waters of Guinea andwe've documented three of the four doing just that.
The appearance of our helicopter provoked a dramatic reaction - it was like a cat amongst pigeons. The crews dashed around the decks closing hatches, disengaging the crane hook about to transfer a load of fish awaiting transfer, and releasing the lines securing the ships to one another. With in half an hour, Binar 4 was heading north, while the trawlers headed back into Guinean waters.
This isn't an isolated case - during the Esperanza's patrol off the coast of West Africa, we documented 104 foreign flagged vessels, from Korea, China, Italy, Liberia and Belize. We gathered evidence suggesting that around 50 percent of the ships were involved in, or least linked to illegal fishing activities. This includes fishing without a license, operating with no name or hiding their identity, trawling inside the 12-mile zone restricted to local fishermen, or transshipping anywhere other than the Guinean capital Conakry.
We made radio contact as the Binar 4 steamed north. They told us they were heading to Las Palmas and had been in international waters to tranship because they were "worried about the army in Guinea Conakry". They had 10,000 boxes of fish on board - and weren't full! Apparently their dramatic departure was due to having "just got a call from Las Palmas" saying that that they needed to go there... What a coincidence!
"In the past few weeks we have begun to unravel the web of deceit around pirate fishing," said campaigner Sarah Duthie, from on board the Esperanza. "The way the legal and illegal ships work together is designed to deceive, but in the end it is a simple case of stealing food from others."
We found the Binar 4 being loaded with fish boxes from two Chinese fishing vessels - Lian Run 24 and Lian Run 27. Two more, the Lian Run 28 and Lian Run 29 were standing by, waiting to unload their catch.
Confused? That's exactly what the pirates want!
All four trawlers have been fishing in Guinea - so transferring their catch (transshipping) in international waters is illegal. The only place wheretransshipping of Guinean-caught fish is legal is in the port of Conakry. Allfour of these Lian Run boats are licensed to fish in the waters of Guinea andwe've documented three of the four doing just that.
The appearance of our helicopter provoked a dramatic reaction - it was like a cat amongst pigeons. The crews dashed around the decks closing hatches, disengaging the crane hook about to transfer a load of fish awaiting transfer, and releasing the lines securing the ships to one another. With in half an hour, Binar 4 was heading north, while the trawlers headed back into Guinean waters.
Talk about acting suspiciously!
This isn't an isolated case - during the Esperanza's patrol off the coast of West Africa, we documented 104 foreign flagged vessels, from Korea, China, Italy, Liberia and Belize. We gathered evidence suggesting that around 50 percent of the ships were involved in, or least linked to illegal fishing activities. This includes fishing without a license, operating with no name or hiding their identity, trawling inside the 12-mile zone restricted to local fishermen, or transshipping anywhere other than the Guinean capital Conakry.
We made radio contact as the Binar 4 steamed north. They told us they were heading to Las Palmas and had been in international waters to tranship because they were "worried about the army in Guinea Conakry". They had 10,000 boxes of fish on board - and weren't full! Apparently their dramatic departure was due to having "just got a call from Las Palmas" saying that that they needed to go there... What a coincidence!
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