Posted on 01/08/2010 4:19:19 PM PST by PJ-Comix
ENVIRONMENT lobby group Sea Shepherd has lodged a piracy complaint in the Netherlands against the captain and crew of a Japanese ship that collided with one of its vessels.
"We have lodged a complaint of piracy with the Dutch prosecuting authority against the captain and crew of the Japanese vessel," Sea Shepherd legal representative Liesbeth Zegveld told AFP today.
"This was close to murder. It was such an extreme act that if no-one takes action now, we may have an even more serious incident in future."
The New Zealand-registered Ady Gil, a high-tech protest boat of the Sea Shepherd group, sank on Friday after being badly damaged in a collision with a Japanese ship, the Shonan Maru 2, two days earlier.
Both parties blame each other for the crash.
Zegveld claimed the collision was "an act of violence" and said the damage was close to $US1 million ($A1.09 million). One of the crew suffered broken ribs.
Piracy enjoys universal jurisdiction, the lawyer said, and "any state is competent to deal with this case".
The Netherlands was chosen since one of the crew was Dutch and the Sea Shepherd's main ship, the Steve Irwin, is registered in the Netherlands.
"We want the crew of the Shonan Maru 2 to go to jail," Zegveld said. "We will bring a civil suit later to recoup the financial losses."
Prosecution spokeswoman Marieke van der Molen confirmed that a complaint had been received on Friday.
"There will be an initial examination before we decide whether or not to open a full investigation," she said. Sea Shepherd claims to have saved hundreds of whales by chasing the Japanese whaling fleet.
The video makes it obvious the Sea Shepard rammed that ship, either by negligence or on purpose.. either way, I hope those hippies one day have a face of with Somali pirates. I would pay to watch that.
Bob Barker (the game show guy) bought them a $5Million dollar boat.
After watching these creeps on their TV show, I was pleased to see them finally get what was coming to them. Maybe Japan should dispatch some warships to protect their whalers and blast these guys out of the water.
A number of years ago, I had the displeasure of meeting Paul Watson, the Capt. of the Sea Shepherd. Watson and his crew were arrogant jerks to the extreme.
I wouldn’t have had any problem if the Japanese had sent those boats to the bottom.
The ship that Bob bought for these numbskulls is still afloat. For now.
Bingo. The side flying the skull and crossbones accuses the other side of piracy!
Trust fund idiots playing pirate—what did they think would happen?
20,000 tons of steel meets 20 tons of plastic.
Guess who wins.
do you have a link to the video on youtube?
P.S. Does anybody really believe that fat bloviating slob captain is a vegan?
Suicidal too.
The sea shepard nutz were flying the jolly roger and had it on their boat’s ‘fins’. Nautically, a ship flying those colors are by definition a pirate. Doubt that the dutch have jurisdiction over that part of the ocean anyway.
Morons were trying to drag a cable around the ship to entangle its prop and rudder. Plus the story says their state of the art boat was capable of 50 knots. Good luck with that Japanese piracy charge y’all. lol
Just like the mugger who becomes the poor victim when their victim pulls a gun and shoots him.
Even though it sank anyway, it’s too bad the whaler didn’t hit the pirate ship across one of those wings rather than cutting off the nose.
Oh I get it.
The Ady Gil, under its previous ownership, set a record for circumnavigation of the world last year. It is very far from "unseaworthy."
In any case, this is a farce. A comparable situation would be me cutting off a semi on the interstate while driving a Ferrari and then blaming the trucker for running me over.
They are typical Liberals
What ever actions they do they are justified, but if someone uses the same tactics against them, then oh boy, here comes the whining
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