BarentsNews.com

On September 10th, 2002, Norwegian coast guards detained “Vasily Zaitsev”, a vessel owned by Murmansk Trawl Fleet-1, which had been fishing herring in the Norwegian economic zone. The next day, the same happened to another Russian vessel, the big stern refrigerated trawler “Tsimlyansk” belonging to Murmanseld-2.

“Vasily Zaitsev” was claimed to have exceeded the allowable volume of cod and saithe by-catches. The shipowner’s administration, in their turn, made an attempt to justify the extra by-catches by the lack of applicable regulating documents.

As for “Tsimlyansk”, its detaining was due to incorrect data declared in the vessel’s fishing logbook.

The trawlers were taken to the ports of Harstad and Troms? until the resolving of the situation, which actually didn’t take much time. As soon as two days later, the vessels resumed fishing, for both shipowners agreed to pay the imposed fines (or bank guarantee) without delay.

It proves, in fact, that the Russian shipowners have admitted their guilt of breaking the fishery regulations, and recognized that the Norwegian authorities had acted legally.