Icelandic whalers kept in port by women who chain selves to masts

(Beth Clifton collage)

Anahita Babaei and Elissa Biou held out through cold night,  Babaei without food or water,  but surrendered after 33 hours

REYKJAVIK, Iceland––Slipping aboard the Icelandic whaling vessels Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9 at approximately 5:00 a.m. on September 4,  2023,  anti-whaling activists Anahita Babaei and Elissa Biou climbed the masts of each ship and chained themselves into the crow’s nests where whale spotters would have been,  had either ship been able to leave port.

Biou climbed down and Babaei was helped down with police assistance about 33 hours later,  as the weather in Reykjavik grew increasingly foul.  A police ambulance was sent to the scene,  but both women were taken away in an ordinary police car,  said Linda Blöndal of RUV,  the Icelandic national television station.

“Anahita called from the mast,  in English,  “Sorry we couldn’t stay longer,”  Blöndal reported.

Earlier in the morning,  Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK activist Nic Clifford was arrested while attempting to take food and water to Babaei and Biou,  Watson posted to Facebook.

Anahita Babaei and Elissa Biou climb the whaling ships’ masts.
(Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK photos)

Both women endure

Police had indicated that neither ship would be allowed to leave port with the women aboard.

Kristján Loftsson,  owner of the whaling company Hvalur hf,  told RUV that regardless of the protests,  the Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9,  would most likely leave port anyway,  due to the weather.

“You can’t hunt whales in a sea of ​​waves,”  Loftsson said.  It’s not like being on a surfboard.  The sea needs to be calm and quiet in order to go whaling.”

But both the Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9 left port to kill whales in late afternoon,  about two hours after Anahita Babaei and Elissa Biou were taken away.

Anahita Babaei in a Hvalur ship’s crow’s nest.
(From Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK video.)

“No one wanted this”

Babaei,  33,  a film maker from Iran,  now living in Italy,   endured at least 27 hours without food or water,  police having pulled her backpack of supplies out of the crow’s next at about 7:00 a.m. in a futile attempt to dislodge her.

“No one wanted this.  For me, this is a nightmarish situation,” fellow film maker Micah Garen,  55,  an American noted for award-winning investigative reporting in Iraq and Egypt,  who watched Babaei and Biou from the dock below.

Garen knows more than just a little bit about nightmarish situations,  having been kidnapped and held for nine days by Shia militants in Iraq in August 2004,  and having been extensively interrogated by Italian military officers a week earlier,  after exposing a war crime––shooting at an ambulance––for which three Italian soldiers were later charged.

Garen and Babaei had been in Iceland producing a documentary “about how people can join hands and change the world,”  Garen told media,  adding “Now it looks like the film will be about how people risk their lives for a situation that never changes.”

Micah Garen.  (From RUV video.)

Captain Paul Watson Foundation volunteer

Elissa Biou,  35,  of France but living in London,  is in Iceland as a volunteer for the Captain Paul Watson Foundation United Kingdom,  as part of what Watson calls “Operation Paiakan,”

“Operation Paiakan,”  the first campaign by the Captain Paul Watson Foundation,  is meant to keep Kristján Loftsson,  81,  owner of Hvalur,  the last Icelandic whaling company,  from killing any whales this year.

Watson formed the Captain Paul Watson Foundation after a hostile takeover led by Florida land developer Pritam Singh ousted him from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society,  which Watson founded in 1978.

(See PIRATES! Captain Paul Watson goes down with the sinking Sea Shepherds.)

Biou,  reported Ragnar Visage of the Icelandic television station RÚV,  “released a personal statement in which she says she climbed the mast of Hvalur 8 to try to prevent the killing of endangered species.

“In the statement,  she says she regrets the [Icelandic food,  agriculture,  and fisheries minister Svandís Svavarsdóttir’s] decision to allow whaling again,  and says the hunt violates Icelandic animal welfare laws.”

Imogen Sawyer.  (From RUV video.)

“Making her own personal statement”

Said fellow Captain Paul Watson Foundation volunteer Imogen Sawyer,  “We’re staying here at the harbor,  because Elissa has been on campaign with us,  and is now making a personal statement. Our hope is that Elissa achieves her goals,  which are to keep those whaling vessels in harbor,  and to make people talk,  and think about whaling , and Svandis’ decision,  and whether it actually should be reviewed.

“I am not in contact with Elissa today,”  Sawyer added. “She’s up here making her own personal statement.  I’m on the ground simply to show her that she has support.  We have had a crew presence here all summer,  in case the situation changed rapidly,  and at the moment we are a crew of four.

“If Hvalur can go out whaling,”  Sawyer indicated,  the Captain Paul Watson Foundation would send additional crew.  I am the crew coordinator for this campaign,”  Sawyer said.

“I’m doing the organizing in the background,”  Sawyer explained,  “so that the activists can be here,  documenting the whales as they come into the whaling station.”

The crow’s nests,  activists’ heads barely visible.  The men on the ladders are police.  (From RUV video.)

Literally a stand-off;  no way to sit

Vísi photographer Ívar Fannar and television journalists Ragnhildur Þrastardóttir and Elísabet Inga,  among others,  produced live coverage of the stand-off late into the night,  pledging to resume at dawn on September 5,  2023.

For Babaei and Biou it is literally a standoff,  since the narrow confines of the cylinder-like crow’s nests allow them no opportunity to change positions.

“They are doing what Svandís Svavarsdóttir did not do,”  Iceland Friends of the Whales spokesperson Valgerður Árnadóttir told media.

“I completely understand this situation.  It is not common in Iceland for citizens to take matters into their own hands when the authorities do not,” Árnadóttir said.

“They are showing courage by doing this.  It is not easy to do this,” Árnadóttir emphasized.

Valgerður Árnadóttir.
(Facebook photo)

“Every whale they save matters”

A considerable crowd gathered to watch the confrontation during the morning,  but as clouds rolled in and a cold wind rose,  the crowd dwindled to about 15 fellow anti-whaling activists.

At about 2:30 in the afternoon the Reykjavík Harbor police moved the bystanders back,  though media were allowed to remain close to the Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9.

“While they are there preventing these ships from going out,  at least they are saving some whales,  and every single whale they save matters,”  Valgerður Árnadóttir said.

Árnadóttir told media that supporters of the protesters fought for eight hours to get water to the protesters,  but police confiscated water bottles from anyone approaching the dock.

Kristján Loftsson, the CEO of Hvalur hf.
(Beth Clifton collage)

“How long can she keep this up?”

“I spoke to one police officer earlier who said that they are waiting for Babaei and Biou to come down themselves,”  reported Élisabet Inga.

“It has gotten a little cold in the area,”  Inga said.  “One of them has some food and water,  but the other has nothing with her.  You wonder how long she can keep this up.”.

Neither police information officer Gunnar Rúnar Sveinbjörnsson nor whaling ship owner Kristján Loftsson responded to repeated media requests for comment.

However,  Ásgeir Þór Ásgeirsson,  senior police officer for the Reykjavik region,  told media that the police might wait for as long as a week,  if necessary,  for Babaei and Biou to descend.

“They are there without permission,”  Ásgeirsson said,  “but as soon as they come to us,  they will be taken to the police station,  a brief report will be taken from them,  and then they can do whatever they want.”

Activists dance in support of whale killing protesters Anahita Babaei and Elissa Biou.
(Paul Watson Foundation Facebook photo)

Dockside concert

“Elissa Biou’s mother asked a reporter to pass on a message,”  RUV said,  “attached to a video of Elissa dancing to Beyonce’s ‘Break My Soul.’  Then the mother said she is proud of her daughter.”

By seven in the evening Icelandic attorney Katrín Oddsdóttir was reportedly pursuing a temporary restraining order against the police for depriving Babaei of water,  an action Oddsdóttir contends violated Icelandic human rights law.

The evening became a dockside concert.

“Protesters have been playing hits all night,”  RUV recounted.  “’Someone like you,’  with Adele,  ‘Killing in the name’ with Rage Against the Machine,  and ‘Bad girls’ with MIA, to name a few.”

News video captured images of Babaei and Biou waving their arms to join their supporters below in a chorus of “YMCA,”  by the Village People.

(Beth Clifton collage)

“I got this fly on my head”

Among the supporters was Icelandic actress Hera Hilmarsdóttir.

“The message from those women in the masts, Anahita and Elissa,  is ‘Stop whaling now!’” Hilmarsdóttir said.

Late in the evening whaling defender Einar Jes Guðmundsson buzzed the protesters in a small boat,  telling them to “Go home and be ashamed of yourselves.”

Explained Guðmundsson,  “I was just passing by the harbor and got this fly on my head.”

Flies preferentially land on shit.

Soon afterward an anonymous supporter of Babaei and Biou,  wearing a wetsuit,  swam alongside the Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9 to flash them a “peace” sign before police hauled him out of the water.

Svandís Svavarsdóttir,  Minister of Food, Agriculture & Fisheries since 28th November 2021.

Svandís Svavarsdóttir first suspended whaling,  then let it resume

Svandís Svavarsdóttir,  after hinting since February 2023 that she might halt the Icelandic whaling season,  finally suspended it in June 2023,  just one day before it was scheduled to open.

Explained Ragnar Visage for RÚV,  “Fiskistofa,  the agency responsible for issuing licenses,  together with Iceland’s veterinary authority,  began regular monitoring of whaling last year when 148 fin whales were caught.  A report on these hunts was published in May,  where the opinion of the veterinary authority was that the hunts were not in accordance with the objectives of Iceland’s Animal Welfare Act.

“A professional council was then established to review the report and offer further guidance.

Svandís Svavarsdóttir.
(Beth Clifton collage)

“Report shocked many”

“The report shocked many,”  Visage said.  “It stated that of the 148 whales killed,  36 were shot more than once.  Five were shot three times,  and four whales were shot on four separate occasions.  One whale with a harpoon in her flesh was chased for five hours.”

The Icelandic veterinary authority also found,  Visage continued,  “that only 67% of the whales died or lost consciousness quickly or immediately.  Killing one whale took almost an hour and killing another took two hours.”

Veterinary authority director Hrönn Ólína Jörundsdóttir called the findings “unacceptable,  and not in the spirit of the law.”

Captain Paul Watson.

First voyage of the Captain Paul Watson Foundation

For the first voyage of the Captain Paul Watson Foundation,  Watson in early summer 2023 took the John Paul DeJoria II into Icelandic waters to confront the Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9.

Loftsson,  claiming possession of an Icelandic government permit entitling him to kill more than 160 whales in 2023,  was reportedly readying his ships to sail,  when “A few hours after the crew of the John Paul DeJoria II arrived in Icelandic waters,”  Watson said,  “Svandís Svavarsdóttir,  the Icelandic minister of fisheries and agriculture,  announced her decision to temporarily stop Kristján Loftsson’s illegal whaling operations.”

But Svavarsdóttir said,  “I have made the decision to temporarily stop whaling in light of the unequivocal opinion of the professional council on animal welfare.  The conditions of the law on animal welfare are inescapable in my mind.  If the government and license holders cannot guarantee welfare requirements,  this activity does not see a future.”

Kristjan Loftsson.
(Beth Clifton collage)

Kristján Loftsson

Iceland is currently the only other nation other than Japan and Norway with a legal commercial whaling industry having left the International Whaling Commission and authorized a whale hunt every year since 2003,  whether or not whales were actually killed.

Loftsson since 2018 has been the only Icelandic whaler still in business,  and sat out the 2019,  2020,  and 2021 whaling seasons.

Loftsson’s father founded Hvalur,  whose name means “whaler” in Icelandic,  in 1947.  Loftsson himself sailed on whaling expeditions beginning at age 13.

But more than just maintaining a family tradition,  which Loftsson insists is an essential part of Icelandic heritage,  Loftsson appears to be driven by a quest for personal vengeance.

Kristjan Loftsson.
(Beth Clifton collage)

Icelandic Ahab

Anti-whaling activists Rod Coronado and David Howitt,  acting under the flag of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society,  in November 1986 vandalized the Hvalur whale processing plant in Hvalfjörður fjord and scuttled the whaling ships Hvalur 6 and Hvalur 7 in Reykjavík harbor.

The Hvalur 6 and Hvalur 7 were both refloated,  but were never repaired and returned to service.

Loftsson replaced them with the Hvalur 8 and Hvalur 9,  of similar appearance but newer construction,  used most recently in his 2018 and 2022 whaling ventures.

Kristjan Loftsson with mutilated fin whale.
(Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK photo)

Icelandic public opinion turns against whaling

Icelandic public opinion does not favor Loftsson,  Ragnar Visage reported for RÚV on August 28,  2023.

A random poll of 1,078 Icelanders done from August 17,  2023 to August 28,  2023,  Visage explained,  found that 42% oppose whaling,  with 29% in favor and 29% undecided.

In May 2022,  Visage recalled,  “35% were in favor,  while 33% were against.

The polling data showed that twice as many men as women favor whaling.

Beth & Merritt Clifton

“However,  male support for whaling has decreased,”  Visage noted,  from 48% to 38%.

“Attitudes also differ according to age,”  Visage observed.  “Only 15% of people aged 18-29 are in favor of whaling,  while in the oldest group, 60 and over,  the percentage is 47%,”  still somewhat less than a majority.

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