Update: AD criticises Malta government's 'irresponsible' vote on tuna

Updated 11:31am with Alternattiva Demokratika statement.

The decision taken late last night now means the 27-nation EU joins international quota talks in Paris being held this week, without a mandate for negotiating tough measures to conserve the fish, whose numbers have declined by more than half over the last 40 years.

Alternattiva Demokratika – the Green Party criticised the vote that blocked the EC proposal to conserve blue fin tuna. Michael Briguglio, AD Chairperson, said: "The proposed cuts of the European Commission would have helped ensure the survival of this species in the Mediterranean. It is shameful that the government keeps playing to the tune of big business interests which are only interested in making as much profit in the shortest timeframe possible, periling tuna populations in the process.

"The unsustainable fishing of blue fin tuna will not only lead to extinction of this fish unless urgent measures are taken, as recommended by the European Commission, by scientists and environmental NGOs such as WWF and Greenpeace, but will also endanger the livelihood of the majority of Maltese fishermen who use traditional modes of fishing'.

The total bluefin quota for 2010 was set at 13,500 tonnes and Damanaki said last month that to give the giant fish a real chance of recovery, the 2011 quota should be set at around 6,000 tonnes at the Paris meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT).

The 10-day ICCAT talks started yesterday.

Damanaki accepted that the need to protect the livelihoods of fishermen would probably dictate a higher quota than 6,000 tonnes. But in a meeting late on Wednesday, EU ambassadors in Brussels, led by France, rebuffed Damanaki's proposal and wrote their own, which barely mentions quota reductions.

"Nevertheless, the Commission will respect its obligations as the negotiator on behalf of the European Union," Damanaki responded in a tersely worded statement.

The agreed EU position asks for ICCAT scientific opinion to be rigorously followed, with the aim of achieving a 60% or higher chance of helping the bluefin population regain sustainable levels by 2022. But ICCAT's scientific opinion is unclear and even conservation-minded scientists on ICCAT's panel accuse fishing nations of submitting unreliable data.

In the meantime, Greenpeace stepped up its demand that the Mediterranean bluefin fishery be closed.

Greenpeace activists hung a banner outside the ICCAT conference venue that read “Bluefin Tuna: 8 Days to Live” and also brought a car with a bluefin tuna on top of it to the venue’s main entrance. Large numbers of police have now surrounded the activists and are trying to pull the banner down.

“This is the final mayday call - years of overfishing, mismanagement and political failure mean that ICCAT must close the Mediterranean bluefin fishery until the species can be shown to have recovered,” said Greenpeace International oceans campaigner Oliver Knowles.

“ICCAT documents released this week show that thousands of tonnes of bluefin tuna are languishing in cages in the Mediterranean, apparently unable to be sold. This begs the question: why continue to fish an endangered species if thousands of tons of it cannot be sold?

According to ICCAT documents, as much as 10,200 tonnes of bluefin tuna remain alive in cages in Mediterranean tuna farms, close to the entire bluefin quota allocated for 2010. Most of this caged tuna was kept in Croatia (up to 4,400 tonnes), Malta (up to 2,800 tonnes) and Turkey (up to 1,900 tonnes).

The majority of this tuna was caught in 2009 and remains unsold, raising serious questions about the need to fish for this endangered fish at all in coming years.

Greenpeace claims that the bluefin catch in 2007 alone was 61,000 tonnes: twice the agreed legal catch limit and four times the scientific recommended catch. “Continued overfishing will close this fishery eventually anyway – a good decision here at ICCAT can rescue bluefin and ensure that future generations have a healthy fishery instead of empty seas,” Knowles said