Paul Watson's petition for release on bail was rejected by a Dutch court on 26 May. He was remanded in custody for two more weeks. Within this period the court will submit its recommendation concerning the Norwegian petition for extradition to the Dutch Ministryof Justice. Paul Watson of the organisation Sea Shepherd has been sentenced to 120 days inprison in Norway for attempting to sink the whaling vessel "Nybræna".
Watson has been remanded in custody in the Netherlands since 2 April. Watson's lawyer warns that if the Netherlands decides to allow extradition to take place, the decision will be appealedagainst. If Watson had served the sentence in Norway he would automatcally have been released after 80 days, says Nordland County Public Prosecutor, Geir Fornebo, to the Norwegian news agency, NTB. "It is obvious that there will be no grounds for extradition if Watson makes full use of the possibilities he has of appealing. Therefore we do not expect him to be extradited", says Fornebo.
The grounds for the petition for extradition also included the charge against Watson in connection with a collision with the coastguard ship Andenes in the summer of 1994. Watson is charged with having refused to leave Norwegian waters on the orders of the coastguard, with having collided with the coastguard ship by negligence and with having sent out false distress signals. The Dutch court decided that none of these charges would involve a sentence which would justify extradition, according to the Norwegian news agency NTB (29/5/97). The court's assessment of the petition for extradition will, therefore, be exclusively based on the ruling in the Nybræna case. Police inspector Elisabeth Kaas, at Police Headquarters in Lofoten and Vesterålen, told the NTB news agency that the European extradiction convention requires that all charges be included in a petition, whether or not they would provide grounds for extradition.
Norway has also petitioned the Netherlands to be allowed to have Watson examined by a judge regarding the Andenes case and to be allowed to serve the charges. The Dutch authorities will make a decision on this before the new period of remand in custody is over (NTB 22 May 1997).
Sea Shepherd claims on its home page that "if Paul Watson is extradited to Norway, he will die in prison" http://www.estreet.com/orgs/sscs/wh/no/pwhelp.html
His Dutch lawyer claimed in the courtroom that Norwegian whalers are
out to "drink Watson's blood".