Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

SchNEWS: For Pete's Sake

SchNEWS 718 | 15.04.2010 19:05 | Animal Liberation | Ecology | Ocean Defence | South Coast | World

Banged up Sea Shepherd campaigner Pete Bethune is facing a long prison sentence after boarding a Japanese whaling ship during protests in the Southern Ocean in February. Operation Waltzing Matilda was the most successful Sea Shepherd campaign yet against illegal Japanese whaling (see SchNEWS 713), but it wasn't without a cost for Sea Shepherd after their £2 million boat the Ady Gil was rammed and sunk by a whaler on January 6th.

On the Newswire: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

In SchNEWS: 713 | 705

Links: www.seashepherd.org

Peter Bethune onboard the MV Steve Irwin
Peter Bethune onboard the MV Steve Irwin


Bethune was captain of the Ady Gil at the time. He later undertook a one-man mission to board the offending whaler - Shonan Maru No. 2 – to confront and make a citizen's arrest of its captain and to hand him a bill for £2 million. The captain of the Whaler is not even being investigated by Japanese authorities after ramming and sinking another vessel at sea, putting six lives in danger.

After Bethune boarded the boat, it set a course for Japan to turn him in to the authorities. He is now on charges of assault, illegal possession of a knife, destruction of property, obstruction of business and trespassing. The charges could land him a prison sentence of up to fifteen years plus fines. Sea Shepherd are calling him a political prisoner.

Figures just back on this year's whaling season show how successful Operation Matilda was. Over half of the 1035 whales which the Japanese government had (illegally) permitted to be killed were saved. Of the 935 protected minke whales earmarked for death, only 506 were killed, the whalers failed to bag any of the 50 allotted endangered humpback whales and only one of the 50 endangered fin whales.

The Japanese whalers will have lost a lot of money as they need to kill 700 whales to break even – and that's not including the additional expenses of the security, surveillance flights, extra fuel used while being chased, public relations and paying workers on ships as they did nothing. Following this year's low catch, the Japanese Fisheries Agency Takashi Mori laughably said, "The lack of samples could affect the accuracy of our research."

Send Pete emails to supportpete@seashepherd.org or donate money to the legal campaign – see Support Captain Bethune

CAMPHILL RACES

Dan Wadham, long term AR prisoner was punished this week for daring to raise money for Sea Shepherd. Dan is serving five years for activities relating to SHAC (see SchNEWS 663) and is currently at HMP Camp Hill on the Isle of Wight. Having access to a small prison running track, he hit on the idea of doing a sponsored marathon. He completed the well publicised run on 15th April - without any interference from the prison authorities. However this week he found his prisoner status had been dropped from 'enhanced' meaning a significant loss of privileges. The prison's security advisor had apparently retrospectively decided that this charitable act counted as a 'political action'.

To write to Dan Wadham (A5705AA), HMP Camp Hill, Newport, Isle of Wight PO30 5PB

Also in SchNEWS 718: Tar-Mageddon | Crap Arrest Of The Week | Camp Hill Races | Counter Punch | Lunartics And Asylum | Experimentalists | Mains Still At It | Milking It | And Finally

SchNEWS 718

Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech