FISHING INDUSTRY leaders have warned that the annual EU fish quota carve-up which opens in Brussels this evening will be "one of the most difficult in recent years".
While stopping short of describing it as "Armageddon", as forecast by the Scottish counterparts, the Federation of Irish Fishermen (FIF) says that Minister of State for Fisheries Tony Killeen faces a very tough task.
Abolition of a long-standing policy initiative known as the Hague Preferences and a proposed moratorium on whitefish catches in the northwest are among the key challenges identified by Mr Killeen.
The fish talks are expected to run all-night tonight, and Mr Killeen attended a briefing session in Brussels yesterday.
The FIF has called on Mr Killeen to "robustly defend Ireland's position and to reject proposals that run counter to the sustainable development of the Irish industry".
"Any diminution of the Hague Preferences cannot be countenanced and would be totally discriminatory," the FIF chairman, Gerard O'Flynn, said yesterday. "It would completely weaken the position of an already hard-pressed whitefish sector and add to the frustration of coastal communities with the European Common Fisheries Policy [CFP]," he said.
The so-called Hague Preferences were offered to Ireland after EU accession in 1976 in return for access to Ireland's rich fishery within the 200-mile limit.
The preferences give Ireland additional quota in certain species, and have previously come up for review during general CFP reviews.
However, a European Court of Justice challenge has resulted in an annual attempt by other EU member states to strip Ireland's industry of this protection. It is understood that it was identified as a priority this year by the French EU presidency.