Saturday, June 11, 2011

Sea Shepherd’s Operation Blue Rage 2011 has certainly enraged Tunisian fishermen operating on Melita Bank, roughly 70 nautical miles off the Libyan coast and 20 miles inside the NATO no fly zone.

MOST angling gear is designed to hold onto fish. But some new equipment is fine-tuned to be more selective — holding tight to some fish and letting go of others, especially if they are Atlantic bluefin tuna — a fish whose numbers have fallen sharply.

Starting this month, commercial fishing vessels that drop long lines in the Gulf of Mexico in search of tuna are mandated to use lightweight circular hooks that retain approved fish like yellowfin tuna, but flatten under the weight of the far heavier bluefin and allow them to swim free.

BRUSSELS — France, Spain and other Mediterranean nations forced the European Union to retreat Thursday from an ambitious plan to save the threatened and prized bluefin tuna.

After drawn-out negotiations, the 27-nation EU abandoned a plan to seek cutbacks in fishing quotas based only on scientific advice and said Thursday it will now also consider the interests of tuna fishermen.