According to engine-master Giuseppe Giordano, who spoke to MaltaToday (‘Sicilian fisherman ‘ruined’ by €35,000 fine’, 27 January 2010) “we didn’t know that Malta had such a vast exclusive fishing zone, as we are only used to what is the norm in many countries, that is, 12 miles from shore.”
First of all ignorance of the law is no excuse. Furthermore, the vast majority of states had/have a 200-mile Exclusive Fishery Zone (EFZ) which some kept while most have changed to a 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) (Part V of the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention).
Fishing is covered both by the EEZ and also by the Continental Shelf (CS) regime (Part VI of the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention) according to the species. The CS is also 200 miles, but in certain circumstances may extend to 350 nautical miles (Article 76 1982 Law of the Sea Convention).
Indeed, by the mid-1970s there were so many states claiming a 200-mile EFZ that a rule of customary international law had emerged that allowed states to claim such a zone. The EU itself had encouraged its member states to claim a 200-mile EEZ in the North Sea and the Atlantic which became effective from 1 January, 1977.
One can go even earlier and refer to the Truman Fisheries Proclamation of 1945 (American Journal of International Law 1946 Supplement, p45) which empowered the government to establish ‘explicitly bounded’ conservation zones in areas of the High Seas ‘contiguous to the United States’.
This led other South American States, Argentina and Panama in 1946, Chile Ecuador and Peru in1947, El Salvador and Honduras in 1950 to claim the natural resources of the epicontinental sea, effectively a 200-mile EFZ. They were followed by Iceland in 1948, India in 1956 and Sri Lanka in 1957.
It is obvious that such an extended zone cannot be claimed in the Mediterranean due to its size, but if Giuseppe Giordano didn’t know it he is no fisherman – which I don’t believe, since I believe that he only wanted to pull our legs and raise sympathy which he will not get because he thought that we are fools.
As for Ray Bugeja, does he expect that Malta should allow other countries fishermen to deplete our fishing zone more than they have already done? Since the Italians have such a large coast why should they come and fish in our waters?
They cannot as they would be overlapping Malta and ending near the Libyan/Tunisian coasts from Italy and the Libyan and Tunisian deserts if they measure the distance from Lampedusa, and Sardinia. This is apart from having tacitly accepted our 25-mile EFZ since Italy was not a persistent objector to our claim.
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