August 14, 2020, 7:00 pm
By: Televistazo
Defense Minister Oswaldo Jarrín asks the international community for support to prevent the degradation of protected areas at sea by foreign fishing vessels. While from the National Assembly it is proposed that Ecuador present this issue to the United Nations (UN).
The alert is not extinguished and according to Minister Jarrín, the issue could get worse. During his appearance at the Assembly’s Sovereignty and International Relations Commission, he mentioned that the Government has a plan in place to prevent any invasion of the territorial sea.
“The most probable thing is that some of the fishing vessels will enter the Exclusive Economic Zone over which we do have jurisdiction and that is the ability to take them before the law and also for military action, and that is the reaction,” Jarrín said.
For the assemblyman, César Rohon, the analysis of this issue should not only be inside the house. “This has to be intervened within the framework of the United Nations. Ecuador has to file a lawsuit.”
This, according to the Defense Minister, must be accompanied by Ecuadorian legislation. “The law is the factor that is needed. It is not possible to operate without law, if we want to proceed with true power, it is not only force, it is that the law empowers and gives it powers so that the Armed Forces can act.”
In the same legislative session, the president of the Galapagos Government Council, Norman Wray, spoke of the need to improve controls, even within the Insular Exclusive Economic Zone, that is, within 200 miles around the archipelago. “Work is being done and the work of the Galapagos National Park is being supported in the search for resources also in order to target the monitoring systems and strengthening of satellite tracking.” In this context, Wray confirmed that last year they stopped 6 Peruvian flag vessels fishing illegally within the Ecuadorian limit.
Read the original coverage at: https://www.ecuavisa.com/articulo/noticias/nacional/633426-ecuador-pide-apoyo-evitar-depredacion-areas-protegidas
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