Two men from Ecuador accepted as refugees in Canada want justice, after successfully claiming they were fed to sharks over a bet, threatened with death and raped on the fishing ship Dolphin Free
Published: Agence France-Presse, August 9 2006
By Deborah Jones, VANCOUVER, Canada
Two brothers enslaved and tortured on a deep sea fishing boat, and who recently won refugee status in Canada, want the boat’s owners brought to justice.
Based on their grisly tales of being fed to sharks over a bet, threatened with death and raped on the ship Dolphin Free, a Canadian tribunal ruled brothers Paulo Cesar Romero Cedeno and Christhian David Romero Cedeno can stay in Canada.
Now their spokesman, Rasik Shah, says they want the ship’s owner prosecuted. They said the Dolphin Free is owned by their aunt Julie Smith and her boyfriend, of New Zealand.
The men, from Ecuador, escaped from the ship here in 2004, and made a refugee claim. In a written ruling last month Immigration and Refugee Board adjudicator Fred Hitchcock called the men “very credible and trustworthy.”
Paulo Romero Cedeno, 28, told the board that one night on the ship “the captain and two Fijian crew members grabbed him, took off his clothes, soaked him in fish blood and then the captain threw him into the ocean,” said Hitchcock’s decision, which Shah provided to AFP. When Paulo Romero Cedeno was pulled out of the water, he discovered there was a bet on whether sharks would kill him.
Rev. William Pike, the Senior Port Chaplain in Vancouver with the Mission to Seafarers, said cases like the brothers are rare on ships travelling to developed countries like Canada.
But a June report by the London-based International Transport Workers’ Federation, “Out of Sight, Out of Mind,” documented frequent abuses of human rights at sea. “The maritime and fishing industries continue to allow astonishing abuses of human rights of those working in the sector,” it said. While some crimes are commited by “rogue elements” it said exploitation is routine, and worse on fishing vessels. International standards apply to nearly 99 per cent of transport vessels, but less than three per cent of fishing vessels.
“We're aware of many cases, though this one is particularly bad,” federation spokesman Sam Dawson told AFP in an email.
The brothers told the adjudicator that Smith offered Paulo Cedeno a job in 2002, flew him to Canada where the Dolphin Free was in port. She failed to help him after he complained of being tortured, they said, and later sent Christhian Romero Cedeno, 21, to the ship in 2003.
Christhian Romero Cedeno told the tribunal he was coerced to join the ship after the aunt told him she had a New Zealand student permit for him.
When the pair’s mother died in Ecuador in Dec. 2003, Paulo Romero Cedeno was allowed to attend her funeral but his brother was held hostage, and the pair were told Christhian would be killed if Paulo told anyone about their treatment or failed to return. Christhian was also “sexually assaulted by crew members,” said Hitchcock’s ruling.
The pair escaped in November, 2004, when the ship docked in Vancouver. They found a Spanish-speaking woman in a shopping mall who knew an immigration consultant who helped them file a claim and find a home. Both men now work as construction labourers and plan to remain in the city, said Shah, a retired lawyer and immigration consultant.
“We’d like to get some compensation, and for their aunt to be punished,” said Shah. “Slavery goes on in the high seas on fishing vessels, and they may still be doing it with other people.”
But prosecution or other legal remedies may be complicated by the international jurisdictions, said Ian Townsend-Gault, a law professor at the University of British Columbia. He noted that seamen’s organizations have claimed about poor working conditions on international vessels, but because ships fly flags of convenience and are often registered in third-world countries like Liberia, regulation is difficult. “How could countries like Liberia which can’t even run themselves police these things?”
“We need to know a lot more information about the terms and conditions on which people are on on ships,” said Townsend-Gault. ”Seamen’s organizations say people are held or are working shifts and in conditions that would lead to prosecutions in Canada.”
Copyright Deborah Jones 2006
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