Joe Borg to meet Italian, French fishermen

EU Fisheries Commissioner Joe Borg will meet a delegation of blue fin tuna fishermen in Brussels on Monday morning, sources said yesterday.

A delegation of eight persons representing the Italian and French fishermen who staged a three-hour protest outside the European Commission Representative Office in Ta' Xbiex on Tuesday will leave Malta on Sunday.

Pasquale della Monica, a spokesman for the fishermen during the protest, will head the delegation for talks with Dr Borg.

Following the news that they will be meeting Dr Borg, the fishermen cancelled plans to stage further protests to raise public awareness about their situation.

At one point during the protest on Tuesday, there was talk of the fishermen blocking Grand Harbour and Marsaxlokk with their trawlers.

About 300 Italian and French fishermen whose vessels are currently berthed in Malta had protested over the EU ban, which came into force on Monday, stopping tuna fishing by the use of purse seine nets.

Though the fishermen strongly insist that this month they only fished for five days and that they were still far off from exhausting their quota, Dr Borg issued a statement in Brussels on Tuesday reiterating his position that the season will remain closed. The European Commission, he said, has all the data needed to establish that the EU purse seine fleet has exhausted its quota.