Irish fishermen preparing plan to stop French navy’s military exercises

Irish fishermen are drawing up a plan to try and stop the French Navy from carrying out a military exercise off the southwest coast which they say could damage valuable fishing grounds.

Russia agreed in January to move planned naval exercises outside Ireland’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), which is about 240km off the Cork coast, after high-profile lobbying by the Irish South and West Fish Producers Organisation (ISWFPO) and a request from the Government.

Patrick Murphy, chief executive of the ISWFPO, has called on the Government to ask the French government to relocate these latest planned military training exercises outside the Irish EEZ too.

In a statement on Monday evening the French embassy said it is already in regular contact with the Irish authorities in relation to the exercise. It said that no French vessels will be in the EEZ during the exercise but did acknowledge that “the area affected may potentially include a small piece of the southern extremity of Ireland’s EEZ as a security pattern, approximatively 200km southwest of Ireland territorial waters”.

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Mr Murphy said sonar and missile launches can “severely disrupt” the migratory paths of fish, and dramatically interrupt the breeding season of mackerel and other migratory fish species”.

“The Albacore Tuna fishery is opening for Irish boats on June 23rd in the waters of our continental shelf, which could potentially be disrupted by these live fire exercises, and we also believe it will cause damage to marine wildlife like whales and dolphins who are affected by underwater noise.”

Mr Murphy said the ISWFPO had been asked by its members to draw up and implement a plan to highlight “these dangerous exercises” and to consider “any course of action that may disrupt these French military exercises” due to place on June 21st to June 24th and again on June 27th.

“It is our understanding that live fire exercises cannot take place if our vessels are engaged in fishing in the area, so we are discussing a plan with our vessel-owners and skippers aimed at again carrying out a peaceful protest in our traditional fishing areas near the proposed area of the military exercise.

“We understand that an aircraft exclusion zone has been announced for the area, but we are dismayed at the lack of comment from our Government, bar the Marine notice once again advising us to be cognisant of a marine law that should protect us rather than put us in harm’s way.”

In a statement on the matter from Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney said the department was in ongoing contact with the French authorities in relation to the military exercise.

“As a close EU partner, the Department of Foreign Affairs will, as normal, maintain contact with the French authorities throughout the period of the military exercise,” he said.

Mr Murphy said it would be “infinitely preferable” if the French naval exercises were cancelled.

“If these exercises are not to be cancelled, they should, at the very least, be relocated further south to waters, well outside of the Irish EEZ, beyond our 200 miles limit, and away from our men and women who sail their boats in our fishing grounds,” he said.

Mr Murphy said ISWFPO members had also raised concerns about the likelihood of increased submerged submarine traffic by Nato forces transiting the fishing grounds off the west coast for the duration of the exercises.

“The seas around Ireland are our workplace and while it can be a dangerous and hostile environment to make a living from – we, and our natural resources, deserve the right to protection from unnecessary and dangerous actions by foreign powers.

“The consequence of naval exercises throughout the world’s oceans and seas have been well studied and documented, and their effect on especially whales and dolphins shows increased strandings and mortalities for weeks and months after the event.

“As stated previously, we are calling for a moratorium of 10 years [to] be introduced to stem these unnecessary military exercises, not just for any individual country but for all states that transit our waters,” Mr Murphy said.

According to a marine notice from the Department of Transport, it has been advised by the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) of a missile/rocket firing exercise by the French military in part of the Irish EEZ to the southwest of Ireland.

Military manoeuvres, such as those planned by the Russian Navy and the French Navy within Ireland’s EEZ, are something of a grey area legally, as Lt Commander Shane Mulcahy of the Irish Naval Service explained in a recent article in the Law Society Gazette.

Lt Commander Mulcahy said that the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) enshrined the right of every coastal state to a 12-mile nautical territorial sea within which the full breadth of that state’s laws applies.

Beyond this 12-mile limit, under the UNCLOS, coastal states enjoy an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) out to 200 miles from their coast with enforcement jurisdiction over all economic activities within this area, including regulatory control of fishing and oil and gas exploration.

Lt Commander Mulcahy said that, as such a coastal state can, insofar as UNCLOS provides, prevent activities that impinge on its ability to enjoy economic access exclusively within these waters, but this right is balanced by the fact the oceans beyond the 12-mile limit are considered the high seas.

The high seas are, by definition, a space over which no state can exercise sovereignty where ‘the freedom of the high seas’ reigns supreme and this freedom, which has prevailed for centuries, includes freedom of navigation and overflight and the freedom to lay submarine cables or pipelines.

It is under “this freedom of the seas” principle that the Russian Navy last February and the French Navy this week are seeking to carry out military exercises within the Irish EEZ, even though the right of foreign militaries to carry out an exercise within another country’s EEZ is far from absolute.