Fisheries Debacle Has Ministers Hiding Behind Sailors

New Zealand First believes the government is trying to spin itself out of the embarrassment of being fooled by three rusty trawlers flying false flags.

“Having been a peacekeeper in the Middle East myself, I know a thing or two about rules of engagement,” says New Zealand First Defence Spokesperson Ron Mark.

“If this government has given our Navy rules of engagement, which only permit them to shoot at pirates with a 35mm single lens reflex camera, then those rules are a joke.

“It is rank they paraded HMNZS Wellington’s skipper before the media when Ministers Murray McCully and especially Gerry Brownlee need to front. Where are they?

“As to threatening these poachers with the lawyers, please. Don’t you think they’ll just change their International Maritime Organisation (IMO) numbers to match similar looking trawlers and fly the appropriate flags? They are crooks after all.

“Our sources in the fisheries industry are livid and this government doesn’t seem to realise that New Zealanders will expect prosecutions given the tough talk about collecting evidence and prosecutions. We’ll be regularly asking Minister McCully and the government, ‘have you got them yet?’

“I also doubt other navies will be beating a path to our door given we were made to look like fools. More likely it will be the Illegal, Unregulated and Unreported (IUU) fishing cowboys because they know this government is gullible and weak.

“As these trawlers were in fact ships without nationality our Navy had wide-ranging powers under the law of the sea. This government knows that but has cowardly gone to ground.

“We have major concerns over how this story is changing and must ask why it was acceptable to risk the lives of our sailors trying to board from RHIBs but it was too risky to fire a single 25mm round or machine gun burst across the bow?

“I am afraid this does not put New Zealand on a pedestal internationally because we are on the back foot and at the blunt edge of combating IUUs in the Southern Ocean.

“Lord Nelson must be weeping over how naval courage and daring-do has been replaced by government imposed health and safety assessments and PR spin,” Mr Mark concluded.

ENDS

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