The 14th Regular Session of the Western & Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) adopted a series of Conservation and Management Measures (CMMs), including CMM 2017-02, Conservation and Management Measure on minimum standards for Port State Measures, issued the 7 December 2017. Bar the provisional application of CMM 2017-01 (1 January 2018), the CMMs are set to enter into force 6 February 2018.
For more information, see here.
Filed under State Practice
The 72nd Session of the UN General Assembly adopted A/RES/72/73, Oceans and the law of the sea, and A/RES/72/72, Sustainable fisheries, including through the 1995 Agreement for the Implementation of the Provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks, and related instruments, on the 5 December 2017. Examples of interest, include the proclamation of the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (A/RES/72/73 para. 292-295) and the notable vote against A/RES/72/72 by the USA, a resolution usually adopted by consensus without a vote.
Action on the draft BBNJ resolution, International legally binding instrument under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biological diversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction, Doc. A/72/L.7, was postponed, pending a review of its programme budget implications.
For more information see the UN press release here and UNGA 72nd Session resolutions here. The Draft BBNJ resolution (A/72/L.7) may be found here, and the programme budget implications (A/C.5/72/18) here.
Filed under International Organizations
The Utrecht Centre for Global Challenges (UGlobe) will host a lecture by Japanese Ambassador to the Netherlands, Mr. Hiroshi Inomata, entitled, The Security Situation in the Asia Pacific Region and Japan’s Role, 15 January 2018, at Utrecht University (Utrecht, The Netherlands).
For more information and registration, see here.
Filed under Events
A master of a coastal trading vessel was convicted and fined in Australia’s Cairns Magistrates Court for being in charge of a ship that entered a shipping exclusion area in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. The master pleaded guilty to entering an exclusion zone near the Turtle Group of Islands, 28km northwest of Cape Flattery, in November 2015. Under the Marine Park legislation, ships must only travel in designated shipping areas or general use zones to protect the marine environment, and commercial ships are monitored for their compliance. More information about this case may be found here.
Filed under Jurisprudence, State Practice
The Center for Biological Diversity, Turtle Island Restoration Network and Wishtoyo Chumash Foundation filed a notice of intent to sue the USA National Marine Fisheries Service for failing to protect humpback whale habitat in the Pacific Ocean, where the animals are said to be facing threats from fisheries, ship strikes and oil spills. The document, entitled “Violations of the Endangered Species Act; Failure to Designate Critical Habitat for Distinct Population Segments of Humpback Whales (Megaptera noveangliae)” may be found here.
Filed under Non-State Actors
On 7 December the European Council of the EU approved a directive which gives legal effect to an agreement between EU social partners in the maritime sector. As a result of the agreement with social partners, amendments to the Maritime Labour Convention made in 2014 can be incorporated into EU law. The objective of the agreement is to protect seafarers’ rights in case of abandonment; the agreement also provides compensation for contractual claims for death or long-term disability of seafarers due to occupational injury, illness or hazard. Thanks to the incorporation of the agreement into EU law, seafarers will be covered by a mandatory financial security system. More information about this agreement may be found here.
Filed under International Organizations
Dated the 27 November 2017, the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court acquitted the 35 person aboard the M/V Seaman Guard Ohio, arrested four years ago for offences under the 1959 Arms Act. Of interest to law of the sea scholars, the case touched upon the drawing of baselines, innocent passage, and the stopping and anchoring rendered necessary by force majeure or distress (UNCLOS, art. 18(2)).
A copy of the judgement is available here.
Filed under Jurisprudence
The United Nations Environment Assembly of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), gathered in Nairobi, Kenya, has passed a draft resolution on marine litter and microplastics. This is in line with Sustainable Development Goal target 14.1, which seeks, by 2025, to “prevent and significantly reduce marine pollution of all kinds, in particular from land-based activities, including marine debris and nutrient pollution”. The document, dated 5 December 2017, may be found here. More information about the meeting, which included thirteen draft resolutions and three decisions, may be found here.
Filed under International Organizations
The member states of the informal group “Arctic-five” (Canada, USA, Russia, Norway, and Greenland/Denmark), together with representatives of other states (Iceland, Japan, South Korea, China and the European Union) have reached agreement on a legally binding international agreement that will protect nearly three million square kilometers of the Central Arctic Ocean from unregulated fishing. The initial term of the agreement is 16 years, after which it will automatically be extended every five years unless a country objects or until science-based fisheries quotas and rules are put in place. The NGO Ocean Conservancy has referred to this as an example of the precautionary approach. This accord comes two years after a previously set moratorium. Evidence of this new agreement may be found here: (Canada) (Norway) (EU).
The Ship Pollution Control Implementation Plan of Hainan Province, implemented 3 November 2017 to 3 December 2018, will include a port state inspection campaign. This will be focused upon compliance with the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, 1973 as modified by the Protocol of 1978, Annex VI and the International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships’ Ballast Water and Sediments.
For more information see here (English translation), and here.
Filed under State Practice
De Maribus 