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| The Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries main office in Government Complex Sejong / Korea Times file |
By Kwak Yeon-soo
The United States filed a complaint with the government, Thursday, alleging it was inadequately enforcing restrictions on South Korean vessels' illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing in Antarctica, the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries said Friday.
The move provisionally places South Korea on the U.S. list of IUU countries and could result in sanctions.
In the complaint, Washington said Seoul was failing to monitor illegal fishing in foreign waters, urging the government to implement stronger measures to prevent unlawful fishing activities.
This marks the second time Korea has been designated as a "provisional" IUU country after the U.S. and the European Union made similar decisions in 2013, which were lifted in 2015.
Following the complaint filing, Seoul and Washington will have two years to address the issue in negotiations. If the two parties fail to compromise, the U.S. will officially name Korea as a country engaged in Illegal fishing.
In a biennial report to Congress, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said Korea had "failed to apply sufficient sanctions to deter its vessels from engaging in fishing activities that violate conservation and management measures adopted by the Convention for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR)."
The CCAMLR is an international fishing body established by the U.N. to protect pristine Antarctic waters.
"Korea committed to amending its domestic law to ensure that appropriate mechanisms exist for taking appropriate corrective actions in future cases," it said in the report.
The U.S. complaint came after two Korean fishing vessels ― the Hong-Jin 701 and Southern Ocean ― violated CCAMLR regulations while operating in Antarctic waters in December 2017, according to the fisheries ministry.
The vessels continued their operations despite receiving a closure notification from the CCAMLR.
The owners of the Hong-Jin 701 claimed that its crew did not receive the alert as it was blocked as spam, while the Southern Ocean intentionally ignored the message.
The former were cleared of the charges while the owners of the Southern Ocean received a suspension of indictment in 2018, which entailed an operation ban of 60 days. The crews of both vessels did not receive any criminal punishment.
Despite international sanctions on the two vessels, the government halted a prosecution investigation and allowed the vessels' owners to sell the illegal fishery goods on the international market.
The ministry said the U.S. move to designate Korea as IUU country was inevitable because its revised rules on deep-sea fishing were not passed by the national Assembly by the time it submitted the biennial report.
"We plan to have the revised rules on deep-sea fishing passed by the Assembly within this year," a ministry official said. "That way we will be able to avoid being named as an illegal fishing country, possibly in 2021."
The ministry added that the U.S. has acknowledged that Korea has been making a progress in taking stronger measures against illegal oceanic fishing
Even after the U.S. complaint, local fishing boats will still be allowed to maintain their operations without new restrictions.
However, if Washington officially declares Korea is an IUU country in 2021, it will be banned from exporting fishery goods to the U.S.
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