MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Argentina arrests jigger allegedly poaching.

Argentine Navy corvette ARA Drummond arrested a Korean jigger last March 9 allegedly poaching in Argentina's exclusive economic zone (EEZ), some 350 kilometers (190 nautical miles) east of the Port of San Julián, Santa Cruz province.

Korean flagged Jae Sung was air detected and when approached by ARA Drummond tried to flee. However after a short chase the Korean jigger finally stopped and was inspected by a boarding party which, according to Navy sources, discovered several mismatches between hold contents and documentation, and proceeded to its arrest.

Jae Sung was then escorted to the Port of San Julián, where she will face charges.

This is the fourth incident involving foreign flagged jiggers allegedly poaching in Argentina's EEZ since the beginning of the 2005 squid season.

The first arrest occurred last 10 February, when the Argentine Navy intercepted Taiwanese squid-jigger Hsien Hua 6, 250 kilometers southeast of Puerto Deseado, in Santa Cruz province. A few days later, on 21 February, a Coast Guard vessel arrested another Taiwanese squid-jigger, Chich Man 1, operating without a licence 368 kilometers off Rasa Island, in the Province of Chubut. Early March a Chinese flagged jigger, Zhonz Yuan Yu I, was arrested 199 nautical miles off the coast of Comodoro Rivadavia.

Last February 25, the Argentine Coast Guard arrested the Spanish trawler José Antonio Nores for alleged illegal fishing in the EEZ, 198 miles east of Rasa Island, in the northern area of the Gulf of San Jorge. The trawler was released after Mr. Manuel Nores, owner of the vessel, accepted to pay a 200,000 US dollars fine.

However Mr. Nores' lawyer, Alberto Penelas, interviewed by La Voz de Galicia insisted that as the captain of the vessel repeatedly claimed, and following two reports from experts, it was "fully proved" that the vessel "Jose Antonio Nores" never entered Argentina's EEZ. (FIS/MP).