Paul Watson ship purchased from Japanese government to target whalers, krill fishers

An ice-strengthened ship – purchased from the Japanese government via a ruse – will be based in Hobart to ‘aggressively’ disrupt Japanese whalers and krill fishers in Antarctica.

The Bandero, previously Japanese fisheries patrol vessel Arasaki, anchored off Port Arthur.

An ice-strengthened ship – purchased from the Japanese government via a ruse – will be based in Australia to “aggressively” disrupt Japanese whalers and krill fishers in Antarctica.

Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson told The Australian purchase of the 64m Japanese fisheries patrol ship, just arrived in Tasmania, was partly a response to his belief Japan would resume Antarctic whaling this coming summer. “This vessel is us getting prepared for the return of the Japanese whaling fleet to the Southern Ocean whale sanctuary,” said Mr Watson, who formed his own foundation after being ostracised from Sea Shepherd two years ago.

While Japan had not publicly flagged resuming Antarctic whaling, halted in 2019, it had recently built a long-range whale processing factory ship.

“And the only purpose of that kind of vessel is to go to the Southern Ocean,” Mr Watson said. “It’s been fitted with water cannon to defend itself from us.

“So I believe that’s what their intention is. If by chance they don’t go to the Southern Ocean, then we will go after the krill ­fishery vessels.”

Mr Watson, a veteran anti-whaling crusader, will fly to Australia in November to take charge of the $2m vessel, purchased from Japanese authorities via a dummy company to hide its ultimate owner. “They wouldn’t have sold it to us, otherwise,” Mr Watson said.

Japanese fisheries patrol vessel when it was sailing under the name Arasaki.

The Canadian-born naturalised American, based in Paris, said he had used similar subterfuge to buy a vessel from Japan in 2012. “I can’t believe they did it again,” he said. Previously named Arasaki, the 499 tonne ship was rebadged Northern Horizon and sailed to Tasmania via Korea. In Hobart, it will be renamed The Bandero, after the Tequila brand of American billionaire John Paul DeJoria, a key financial backer of the Captain Paul Watson Foundation.

Mr Watson said he was effectively forced out of Sea Shepherd after some within the organisation came to see him “as a threat” and “too confrontational and too controversial”.

However, many from Sea Shepherd had joined his foundation, which already disrupts whaling in Iceland and Norway using its first vessel, the John Paul DeJoria.

His tactics in the Southern Ocean would continue his long-standing policy of “aggressive nonviolence”. “It’s to aggressively intervene without causing any ­injury to anybody and in 45 years of doing that we’ve never caused a single injury,” he said. Krill fishing has become a significant issue globally, with conservationists and some scientists concerned it is poorly regulated and potentially having localised impacts on key species, including whales.

Mr Watson said there was a “gold rush mentality” by the burgeoning krill industry.

“I really don’t see the point of taking millions of tonnes of krill from the ocean for the sole purpose of making a protein paste for livestock and domestic ­salmon,” he said.

“This is the primary food source for penguins, whales, seals and other creatures. We have observed them (the fishers), so we know how we can disrupt their ­operations – and that’s what we ­intend to do.”

The Bandero will be repainted, refitted and reflagged while in Hobart, docked at Prince of Wales Bay, north of the Tasman Bridge.

Ships operation director Lockhart MacLean said the site was chosen after TasPorts dramatically increased proposed berthing fees for the vessel at Hobart’s ­Princess Wharf.

The Japanese embassy repeated Tokyo’s assurances it would not take whales from the Southern Ocean. TasPorts were yet to comment.