Ireland

Varadkar vows to resolve legal anomaly that led to NI trawler seizure

Taoiseach pledges to unblock remedial legislation in Seanad ‘in next couple of weeks’

The two fishing vessels seized by the Naval Service moored in Clogherhead, Co Louth. File photograph: Niall Carson/PA

Sat Mar 2 2019 - 17:18

A legal “anomaly” that led to the seizure of two small fishing boats from Northern Ireland and drew angry denunciations from pro-British politicians will be resolved, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has promised.

A 60m Irish Naval Service vessel on Thursday impounded two trawlers registered in Northern Ireland for fishing illegally inside the Republic’s six-mile (9.6 km) territorial limit.

The Democratic Unionist Party reacted angrily at the seizure, with deputy leader Nigel Dodds on Thursday describing the incident as “outrageous . . . heavy-handed tactics”. Mr Dodds also accused the Varadkar-led Government of using it as a “bargaining chip on Brexit”, something Dublin has denied.

The owners of the trawlers pleaded guilty to breaching fishing regulations at Drogheda District Court on Friday but a judge decided to release them without levying a fine, according to the BBC.

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An informal bilateral agreement had allowed fishermen from the Republic and Northern Ireland to fish inside the six-mile limit of each others’ jurisdictions, but it was struck down by the Irish Supreme Court in 2016 and the Republic has yet to approve replacement legislation.

Consequently, the Republic’s fishermen can legally fish along Northern Ireland’s coast but Northern Ireland fishermen are prohibited from doing so along the Republic’s coast.

“I think we can have that law changed and that anomaly, if you like, corrected, and we can do that in the next couple of weeks,” Mr Varadkar told LMFM Radio, saying legislation had got stuck in the Senate.

But while Ireland’s Minister for the Marine Michael Creed told RTÉ radio on Friday that the issue had “zero to do with Brexit”, Mr Varadkar linked the dispute with Britain’s post-Brexit plans for its fisheries and whether or not it abide by the London Fisheries Convention, which governs fishing rights in coastal waters off western Europe.

“Obviously it would be useful to know from the United Kingdom side that they are not going to pull out of that London Convention,” he said. “It would be unusual to change our law only to find out that the situation on the other side changed.”

Britain’s withdrawal agreement, which has yet to be ratified by the British parliament, says the two sides would try to agree on the future of fisheries by July 2020, during the transition period after Brexit, to form part of an eventual new EU-UK trade deal. – Reuters

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