Somalia pirates said they had released the Thai-flagged Thai Union 3 ship on Sunday after receiving a $3 million ransom. The tuna purse seiner belonging to Asia’s biggest canned tuna exporter, Thai Union Frozen Products, was seized on October 29, 2009 with 23 Russians, two Filipinos and two Ghanaians on board. “We have released the ship after we received $3 million in ransom,” a pirate named Hassan...

Reports have emerged in Ecuador that the European Union has approached the Embassy of Ecuador in Belgium to inform that the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF ) has received -from various commercial sources- specific allegations that Ecuador imported tuna from third countries and then may have been re-exported to the European Union after processing, making use of certificates...

The Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) meeting has ended today in Busan, Korea, and the preliminary results announced included the non-agreement on a tuna fishing quota – such as the 300.000 tons a year for yellowfin recommended by the scientific commission – and the agreement on a time-area tuna closure for 2011 and 2012, while building a process to improve data and discuss intersectional...

By the start of the second half of 2010, Venezuela’s national fishing fleet -via the Socialist Joint Venture Industrial Pesquera del Alba (Emspia)-, which already has six vessels, will reach a total of 13 boats, with the acquisition of seven new vessels by the Venezuelan State, some of them tuna purse seiners. The Socialist president of the Institute for Fisheries and Aquaculture (Insopesca), Gilberto...