Sydney, Saturday, May 10, 2008 Greenpeace yesterday exposed an illegal tuna purse seiner, the Queen Evelyn 168, in a pocket of international waters between Papua New Guinea and the Federated States of Micronesia. The Queen Evelyn 168 is not authorised to undertake any fishing activities in this part of the Pacific.

This Philippines-flagged vessel was at the site of a transfer of tuna between her sister vessel and a refrigerated mothership, the Kenken 888. It is likely that a transfer of fish at sea involving an illegal vessel was about to occur, but the arrival of Greenpeace prevented it from taking place as the vessels immediately separated and fled.

"Transfers of fish at sea are well known to be facilitating pirate fishing around the world - now we have proof of this in the Pacific and it is unacceptable that this is still allowed to continue", said Greenpeace Australia Pacific campaigner Lagi Toribau on board the Esperanza. "Transfers of fish should only be allowed in port so they can be monitored properly."

"At-sea transfers result in massive underestimation of the Pacific tuna catch. For years tuna have disappeared unreported on motherships like this. The Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission - which is supposed to protect tuna from overfishing - is clearly failing to do so. The only hope for Pacific tuna fisheries is to close the pockets of international waters as marine reserves and to ban all transfer of fish at sea," said Toribau.

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