This summer, when China fired missiles into the sea off Taiwan to protest House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to the island, a very different kind of geopolitical standoff took shape in another corner of the Pacific.
Thousands of miles away, a heavily armed US Coast Guard cutter sailed to a fleet of several hundred Chinese squid-fishing boats not far from Ecuador’s Galapagos Islands. Its mission is to inspect the vessels for signs of illegal, unreported or unregulated fishing.
Boarding ships on the high seas is a perfectly legal, albeit underused, tool available to any naval force as part of the collective effort to protect the ocean’s endangered fish stocks.
But in this case, the Chinese captains of several fishing boats did something unexpected. Three ships sped away, one that turned aggressively 90 degrees toward Coast Guard cutter James, forcing the American ship to take evasive maneuvers to avoid being rammed.
“For the most part, they wanted to avoid us,” said Coast Guard Lt. Hunter Stowes, the top law enforcement officer on the James. “But we were able to maneuver effectively so we were safe the whole time.”
Still, the confrontation on the high seas constituted a potentially dangerous violation of international maritime protocol, one the US sees as a troubling precedent since it happened on the Coast Guard’s first-ever mission to combat illegal fishing in the eastern Pacific.
The Associated Press reconstructed details of the never-before-reported incident by the Coast Guard and six non-military US officials who spoke in more detail about the operation but asked for anonymity to avoid a multilateral process to force China to punish the ships in would endanger. While diplomats in China accused the Americans of acting improperly, they did not provide a detailed account of their own.
The Coast Guard’s unprecedented journey was prompted by growing alarm from activists and governments in Latin America about the activities of China’s offshore fishing fleet, the largest in the world. Since 2009, the number of Chinese-flagged ships in the South Pacific has increased eightfold, sometimes for months, to 476 last year. Meanwhile, the size of squid catches has grown from 70,000 tons to 422,000 — a level of fishing that some scientists fear is unsustainable even for a resilient species.
As revealed in an AP-Univision investigation last year, China’s fleet contains some of the fishing industry’s worst offenders, with a long history of labor abuse, illegal fishing and violations of maritime law. But they’re drawn to the open ocean around America – where the US has long dominated – after depleting fish stocks closer to home and fueled by an increasingly fierce race between the two superpowers to access the world’s dwindling natural resources. .
The illegal fishing patrol, which lasted 10 days in August, was initially kept quiet. The Coast Guard released a brief statement celebrating the mission more than a month later, along with photos of two ships it successfully boarded. But it made no mention of the three who ran away or gave any clue as to the ships’ nationalities — a stance the Coast Guard has maintained in its talks with the AP.
But the incident did not go unnoticed in China.
Within days, Beijing fired off a formal written protest, according to US officials. In addition, the issue came up when US Ambassador Nicholas Burns was summoned by the Chinese Foreign Ministry to an emergency meeting regarding Chairman Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, one of the officials said.
China’s foreign ministry told the AP it has zero tolerance for illegal fishing and said it is the US that is breaking international standards by conducting unauthorized inspections that fail to follow COVID protocols, potentially harming the lives of seafarers is endangered.
“The behavior of the United States is unsafe, opaque and unprofessional,” the State Department said in a statement to the AP. “We demand that the US side cease its dangerous and erroneous inspection activities.”
The Coast Guard disputes that claim, saying all members of the boarding school team, in addition to being vaccinated, wore masks, gloves and long sleeves.
The Biden administration also reported possible violations discovered on the two boats it did inspect to the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organization, or SPRFMO, a group of 16 members — including China and the US — charged with ensuring sustainable fishing in 53 million square kilometers of ocean.
One of the most serious allegations is against the Yong Hang 3, a refrigerated freighter used to transport fish back to China so that smaller vessels can stay on the water for longer periods of time. The ship was among those fleeing the Coast Guard patrol and disobeying direct orders to cooperate from the maritime authorities in Panama, where the ship was under its flag. To cover up activities, some ships, especially refrigerated cargo ships, often sail under different flags, but are named, managed and docked in China.
Ultimately, if history is any guide, the Chinese communist government is unlikely to punish a fleet of 3,000 distant water fishing vessels that it sees as an extension of its expanding naval capabilities and is fostering with generous government loans and fuel subsidies.
Lieutenant Stowes said the Coast Guard patrol was meticulously planned. The United States warned fisheries officials more than a year ago that they planned to board in the area and filed papers with photos of the badges the crew would wear, as well as the blue-and-white checkered flag the cutter would raise. Five other countries, including Chile and New Zealand, have filed similar documents under rules that allow members fishing in the South Pacific to inspect each other’s vessels.
“Just being there and doing the boardings really makes a statement,” Stowes said.
Inspections at sea are considered an essential tool to verify that fishing vessels are following the rules regarding the use of forced labour, environmentally hazardous fishing gear and fishing for endangered species such as sharks.
China has repeatedly blocked attempts to strengthen inspection procedures in the South Pacific. The most recent obstruction occurred last year when China argued that fishermen would be at risk if sea patrols were allowed to carry firearms.
Rules passed unanimously in 2011 are guided by a 1995 United Nations treaty known as the Fish Stocks Agreement, which allows inspectors to use limited force to stay safe.
In a sign of how geopolitical rivalry may escalate since the Pacific incident, an official told the AP that the State Department sent a stern diplomatic note to remind Beijing of its international commitments and its long track record. the distant water fleet in the field of labor abuse and violations.
The Biden administration is also considering whether it will try to blacklist the vessels for illegal fishing and ban return to the South Pacific at an upcoming Ecuador fisheries management organization meeting.
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This story was supported by funding from the Walton Family Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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Goodman reported from Miami. Joe McDonald in Beijing contributed to this report.
Contact AP’s global research team at [email protected]. Follow Goodman on Twitter: @APJoshGoodman.
