Interpol Takes Famed Whale Activist Off Most-Wanted List

Interpol said Tuesday it was removing a most-wanted designation for anti-whaling campaigner Paul Watson, who is sought by Japan over an encounter with a whaling ship and who was jailed for several months last year in Greenland. Watson, 74, is a former head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, whose high seas confrontations with whaling vessels have drawn support from celebrities and featured in the reality television series Whale Wars, per the AP.

Japan wants his extradition over an encounter with a Japanese whaling research ship in 2001, when he was accused of obstructing the crew's official duties by ordering the captain of his ship to throw explosives at the whaling ship. He and his team deny those allegations. Starting in 2012, Watson had been subject to a "red notice" of Interpol, the France-based international police body. A red notice is a request to law enforcement worldwide to locate and provisionally arrest a person pending legal action, based on a warrant from the judicial authorities in the requesting country, in this case Japan.

The Canadian-American activist has long criss-crossed the world's oceans in an almost singular focus on defending whales, feeding his popularity among environmentalists, animal-rights activists, and others. Critics have questioned his often-combative methods. Watson was arrested and jailed on the Japanese warrant last year in Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory of Denmark, but released after five months. "My first reaction is that the decision ends 14 years of politically motivated persecution and underscores the blatant illegality of Japanese whaling operations in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary," Watson said in a brief statement provided by Sea Shepherd France.