Penalties of $275,000 on Korean master

Press, 2 August 1979, Page 3

Penalties of $275,000 on Korean master

PA Auckland Penalties totalling almost 6275,000 have been imposed on the master of a Korean fishing boat found guilty of fishing illegally within New Zealand’s economic zone. An Auckland Magistrate, Mr J. H. Hall, yesterday fined the master, Chun Woong Kim, 810,000. The Nampyung No. 5, valued by the Crown at 6100,000, and her catch, valued at $llO,OOO were automatically forfeited on conviction. The Magistrate ordered the defendant to pay the Crown 653,830 for the cost of the arrest and custody of the boat. The main cost was the fuel bill of $52,500 for H.M.N.Z.S. Taranaki, which escorted the Nampyung No. 5 to Auckland. The defendant was also brdered to pay witnesses’ expenses of $lB4 and $3OO solititor’s fees. The Magistrate said that anything less than the severe

and deterrent penalties the law provided would place the sovereignty of New Zealand in low degree. “It might even make a mockery of it,” he said. The declaration of the 200mile economic zone was a part of State policy, with some national importance. It had to be taken into account that the boat had been fishing about 130 miles inside the zone.

It had been fishing for a number of days on an industrial scale. The catch had been about one tonne a day. Earlier, in a decision which had been reserved after a defended hearing on Monday, the Magistrate had said the Nampyung No. 5 had been found by H.M.N.Z.S. Taranaki 70 miles off Nauru Island, to which the 200-mile zone applied. The boat had not had a licence to fish in the zone. It had been long-line fishing to catch tuna. It had been established that the boat’s navigation equipment was in good order

and that the master knew his position. Counsel (Mr W. D. Mapp) asked the Magistrate to discharge Kim without conviction. He said the' defendant had thought he had been in Tongan waters. The New Zealand Government should be obliged to make charts of the economic zone available in foreign ports. The company which owned the boat was in financial difficulty and the Draconian penalties automatic on conviction could force it into bankruptcy.

The master and the crew would be out of work and had already suffered. The Ministry of Fisheries may seek a redemption fee or else put the Nampyung No. 5 up for tender, now that her master has been convicted of illegal fishing. A decision in this respect is likely to be made today, according to a Ministry official. No decision has yet been made as to when the crew will be repatriated.