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Marine wildlife activist Paul Watson, currently on bail in Germanypending a decision on whether to extradite him to Costa Rica, vowedTuesday that his campaign will go on even if he is tried andjailed. "They hope that by getting me out of the way, they'll shut down ouroperations. They won't," Watson told AFP in a telephone interview. "This is not about me. It is about our oceans and theever-escalating threat of diminishment of the diversity of life inour seas. It is about the sharks, the whales, the seals, the seaturtles and the fish," the 62-year-old activist said. Watson was arrested at Frankfurt airport on May 14 and detained fora week before being released on bail. He told AFP he has been placed under "house arrest" and was obligedto report to the police twice daily. "I want to make it very clear that whatever happens to me will notaffect our campaigns," he said in a separate written statementemailed to AFP. Watson is the leader of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society,whose ships he said would continue to "defend sharks in the SouthPacific, whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary" and dolphinsin Taiji, Japan. "Fortunately, Sea Shepherd is now much bigger than myself... and ifI am prevented from serving on the front lines upon the high seas Iwill serve as a symbol of resistance to the destruction of ouroceans from inside a prison cell." Watson said he planned to travel to Berlin on Wednesday toparticipate in a rally by his supporters on the occasion of a visitby Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla to the German capital. "But I have to be back in Frankfurt by 5:00 pm (1500 GMT) when Ihave to report to the police," he added. In Berlin, he hoped to meet members of Chinchilla's delegation topress for assurances for his personal safety should he really beextradited and face trial in Costa Rica, he said. "Although I have no reason to believe that the Costa Rican legalsystem would not give me a fair trial, my concern is not for thejudicial system, but for the reality that the shark fin mafia ofCosta Rica has a price on my head and a Costa Rican prison wouldprovide an excellent opportunity for someone to exercise thislethal contract against me," he said. "We have cost the shark finners a great deal of money over the lasttwo decades and they want their revenge. I would need absoluteassurance that the Costa Rican authorities would not place me in aposition to jeopardise my safety when I return to Costa Rica toprove my innocence in court." The charges against Watson stem from a high-seas confrontation overshark finning in 2002. Sea Shepherd claims it was escorting an illegal shark finning shipback to port when the crew falsely accused the organisation'smembers of trying to kill them. Watson is accused of "putting a ship's crew in danger". He said it was unusual that an extradition order should be issuedfor "a relatively minor offence, where no one was injured and noproperty damaged." Watson suggested that Japan might be "putting pressure" on Germanyto carry out the extradition order. "It may be more than coincidental that the extradition order wasput out in October 2011 at around the same time that the Japanesebrought civil charges against us -- and lost -- in a Seattlecourt," he said. The Canadian national is well known for his pursuit and harassmentof Japanese whaling boats off Antarctica, which in recent years hassignificantly reduced the number of animals slaughtered. Sea Shepherd has adopted increasingly militant ways to halt thehunt, to Tokyo's irritation. This year the group hurled stink bombs at the boats on the highseas and used ropes to try to tangle their propellers in a seriesof exchanges that saw the whalers retaliate with water cannon. I am an expert from grocerystoreshelves.com, while we provides the quality product, such as China Container Store Shelves , Supermarket Shelf, Custom Made Book Shelves,and more.
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