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Australias Channel Seven News contributed to putting lives at risk in the Southern Ocean this year by funding the terrorist organisation Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
Channel Seven provided Sea Shepherd equipment to record and transmit footage from the Antarctic, as well as enough money to allow a Sea Shepherd member to hire a helicopter in exchange for exclusivity to the images, the Australian Broadcasting Corporations MediawatchEprogramme has revealed.
Sea Shepherd has a well-known history of endangering peoples lives, destroying property and illegally sinking fishing and whaling vessels through the use of explosives or ramming them.
Channel Sevens actions cross the ethical line and takes them from covering the news to making the news. Their sponsorship of Sea Shepherd means their objectivity is questionable. Channel Seven must come clean on the exact nature of the arrangement with this criminal organisation,Esaid JWA President Keiichi Nakajima.
It is not Channel Sevens job to help Sea Shepherd stage events to which that organisation is buying exclusive access,Ehe said. Sea Shepherd was only able to find the research fleet because of funding made available to hire a helicopter. As a result, Sea Shepherd illegally attempted to cut up the hull of the Oriental Bluebird using a protruding, diamond-powdered steel blade it called the can opener and attempted to destroy the Nisshin Marus propeller by throwing wires underneath the stern of the vessel.E
Channel Seven must prove it was not complicit in illegal terrorist activity on the high seas,EMr Nakajima said.
ENDS
For more information, contact Makoto Ito, JWA Secretary, +81 355 471 940
Links to Sea Shepherd Conservation Society website where it claims responsibility for various acts of violence and illegal property damage.
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