Canadian authorities use strong-arm tactics to protect seal killings
Spencer Warren writes:
On Sunday, the second day of the annual government-authorized slaughter off Canada’s east coast of more than 300,000 baby seals for their fur, members of Canadian Royal Canadian Mounted Police and officers of the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans, working hand in glove with seal hunters, harassed and then arrested on trumped up charges legally authorized observers from the Humane Society, a group that included Americans and Britons, plus one reporter. In the past, the Canadian authorities have regularly turned a blind eye to the sealers’ illegal skinning alive of tens of thousands of the baby seals, practices reported by an investigation by independent veterinarians.
This year it is worse, with the authorities actively cooperating with the seal hunters to prevent exposure of the truth.
In one incident, the authorities ignored the observers’ two distress calls for intervention when two fishing boats charged at the observers’ much smaller, inflatable rubber boat, which was rammed by one of the fishing boats and almost capsized—this would have caused the observers’ death within minutes in the frigid water.
A few hours later, the Mounties, who had been lurking unseen in the cabin of one of the fishing boats, came out and apprehended the observers after the fishing boat had forced the observers’ small boat into a position too close to the fishing boat, thereby creating a technical violation of the observation permit. The Mounties (who are Canada’s national police force) arrested and handcuffered the observers, confiscated their video, and suspended their observation permit. In the observers’ opinion, the arrest was carried out for the obvious purpose of hiding from public view the gruesome work of the fishermen-sealers, which leaves the ice flows and water red with blood.
Below is an account of the incident by the lead Humane Society observer, Rebecca Aldworth, a Canadian. There is also a story on this in the Toronto Globe and Mail.
Our two inflatable boats trailed the sealing vessel through the ice at a safe distance—at least 30 meters away. But suddenly the sealers turned around and cut us off. With heavy ice on one side and the sealing vessel bearing down on the other, we had no choice but to cross quickly in front of the sealing vessel to escape a collision.
At that moment, officers from the RCMP and the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) exited the cabin of the sealing boat where they had been hidden from view. They called us over and accused us of having been within 10 meters of a sealing vessel. The RCMP officers immediately confiscated our footage of the hunt (including footage showing how we came to cross in front of the sealers’ vessel) and then informed us that we were under arrest for violating the conditions of our observation permits. The five observers who were not Canadian were brought to the Coast Guard vessel and handcuffed. The Coast Guard held them for five and a half hours before finally returning them to our vessel.
No charges have yet been filed, but it has been made crystal clear to us by representatives of the DFO that they will not issue us any observation permits while the matter is being investigated. By the time this is resolved, the hunt in the Gulf of St. Lawrence will be over.
In a calculated political move, the Canadian authorities have effectively prevented The HSUS, and any journalists who might be riding in our boats or helicopters from documenting the rest of this hunt. But their efforts are in vain: We have already filmed hours of the killing, and the footage is posted on our website.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at March 31, 2006 06:52 PM | Send