"MELBOURNE, Australia -- Sea Shepherd Australia this morning welcomed to Melbourne its three ships and 110 crewmembers after their campaign defending whales in the Southern Ocean against Japanese 'research' whalers."
"All three Sea Shepherd ships – the Steve Irwin, the Sam Simon and the Bob Barker – were damaged after colliding with the Japanese factory ship Nisshin Maru.
The Japanese Institute of Cetacean Research, a government body that runs Japan’s whaling program, claims that Sea Shepherd “sabotaged” its factory ship. Sea Shepherd claims the much larger Japanese ship deliberately rammed the whale defense vessels.
The Sea Shepherd crews endured attacks by concussion grenades and were hit with water cannons as they tailed Japan’s four whaling vessels, interfered with their whale killing activities and tried to block them from refueling. The Japanese vessels had to refuel from a contracted tanker ship, which was engaged after Australia refused to allow the whalers to refuel in Australian ports."
Environment News Service had the story March 20, 2013.
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