Spearhead on fishing

HARD LINE: The launch of Operation Resolute will further enhance Australia’s maritime security.

Volume 49, No. 13, July 27, 2006

The RAN will help spearhead Operation Resolute that was launched on July 17 to enhance the security of Australia’s offshore maritime areas.

Operation Resolute consolidates Defence’s domestic maritime security activities into a single operation that will lead to better coordination of whole-of-government efforts to improve the effectiveness of our national maritime security regime.

Current Defence operations to be consolidated include Relex II (focusing on unauthorised arrivals), Cranberry (illegal fishing and smuggling), Celesta and Mistral (patrols of Australia’s southern ocean EEZ), and patrols protecting Australia’s gas and oil infrastructure.

Operation Resolute is commanded by the Joint Offshore Protection Command (JOPC), which has assumed responsibility for operational coordination and control of both civil and military maritime enforcement activities within the EEZ.

Headed by RADM James Goldrick, the JOPC undertakes planning, surveillance, intelligence analysis and deployments to deliver a coordinated, whole-of-government focus on illegal fishing in particular and maritime security more generally.

Defence Minister Dr Brendan Nelson said protecting Australia’s waters is one of the highest priorities for the Australian Defence Force and applauded the RAN’s apprehension of seven Indonesian iceboats.

In a coordinated operation recently spearheaded by HMA Ships Dubbo and Success, seven Type III Iceboats were apprehended in the Australian Fishing Zone to the north of Darwin.

Dubbo and Success conducted the operation with the support of a Customs Coastwatch surveillance flight in the early hours of Friday July 14.

A total of 67 people were on board the seven FFVs which carried approximately 4300kg of reef fish onboard.
“The capture of these boats shows that the Australian Government and the Australian Defence Force will not muck about when securing Australia’s sovereign waters and economic interests,” Dr Nelson said.

“The apprehension of seven iceboats represents a significant blow against the king-pins financing illegal fishing in Australian waters,” Dr Nelson said.

Dubbo and Success escorted the vessels into Darwin for further investigation by the Australian Fisheries Management Authority (AFMA).

These apprehensions bring the total number of illegal foreign fishing vessels apprehended in Australian waters this year to 214.

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