What’s going on with Paul Watson?

The “political” arrest of a “common enemy”

Paul Watson should be cleared of all charges against him, as the actions he is accused of are, after all, minors and cannot justify his incarceration, according to the president of Sea Shepherd France.

Contacted by Radio-Canada on her return from Greenland, Lamya Essemlali criticizes Interpol for not having assessed the seriousness of the alleged facts before placing Captain Watson on its red list. “Clearly, they have not conducted any investigation,” she insists. “This highlights the flaws in the Interpol Red Notice, which is being misused and used for political purposes, which goes against Interpol’s internal regulations.

Interpol indicates for its part that all requests for publication of red notices are subject to a compliance control [par] a specialized team, composed of lawyers, police officers and operational specialistsThese notices, it is specified, target fugitives accused of having committed offences of a special gravitysuch as murder, rape or fraud.

If she recognizes the obvious interest of the red notice against criminals, Lamya Essemlali specifies that it is not intended, according to her, to harass, track down, imprison and extradite whistleblowers, environmental activists or political opponents.

” We realize, when we look from the outside at the facts that are being accused, that we are in something completely disproportionate. We can clearly see that there is a political will to arrest Paul Watson. »

Through his campaigns that have hurt the economic activities of Japan and Denmark, Paul Watson has also become the common enemy of these two countries where hunting of cetaceans is authorized, according to Ms. Essemlali.

The captain actively campaigned against the grindadrapthe traditional dolphin hunt of the Faroe Islands, an autonomous province of Denmark. The flesh and fat of these cetaceans, which are killed by the hundreds each year, are then shared among the inhabitants.

In the eyes of the Faroese, this practice is at the heart of their identity and has punctuated the daily life of the islanders since the 16th century. But environmental activists see it as a bloodbath unjustified against which the international community should rise up.

There has been a very contentious relationship between Paul and Denmark, and between Sea Shepherd and Denmark, for decades over this issue of the dolphin massacres in the Faroe Islands.she sums up.

In a recent speech in Folketinget, the Danish Parliament, Faroese MP Skaale Sjurðurwho accuses Paul Watson of being a violent manreiterated his desire to see the activist tried and extradited. Watson never championed the cause of whales. He only championed his own cause.he said.