Washington Foreign Press Center Briefing – “Strategic Outlook on U.S. Coast Guard Pacific Operations and Deterring IUU Fishing”
Transcript
Okay. Good afternoon, everyone. And welcome to the Washington foreign press centers on the record briefing on U. S. Coast Guard Pacific operations and deterring illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing. My name is John McAndrew and I am the moderator today. First, I will introduce our briefer and then I will give the ground. Rules are brief for today is the commandant of the U. S. Coast Guard Admiral Carl Shultz, who will give a strategic outlook on the Coast Guard specific operations and partnerships with Pacific Rim nations whose economies and natural resource is air threatened by the People’s Republic of China flagged vessels, disregard for the rule of law and responsible fishing practices. We greatly appreciate Admiral Schultz for giving his time today and now for the ground rules. This briefing is on the record. We will post the transcript of this briefing later today on our website, which is f p c dot state dot gov. Our briefer will give remarks and then we will open it up for Q and A. If you have a question, please open the participant box and virtually raise your hand. At that time, we will, um, you to you so that you can ask your question. Please take the time. Now, if you have not already done so to rename your zoom profile with your full name and media outlet. And with that, I will pass it over to Admiral Schultz already. Well, greetings and thank you to our moderate Jim Nick. And you really appreciate you doing this state Jen. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss the United States Coast Guard and our commitment to a free and open Indo Pacific region of the world. For over 230 years, the United States Coast Guard. We promoted free and open use of the global maritime commerce, and we’ve helped like minded partners and allies strengthen their capacity. Help Holden assert their own sovereignty wherever we sail. That iconic angled orange racing and blue racing stripes that you see in the bio of every Coast Guard cutter since 1967 serves as a global symbol for maritime security and governance. The Coast Guard has an enduring role in the Pacific region that dates back more than 150 years, and one of our key focus areas with Pacific partners has been illegal, unreported, unregulated fishing. What we call I you you fishing? Are you fishing? Is a criminal enterprise that weakens the global rules based order and threatens the sovereignty and economic security of every nation with a maritime nexus. Fish is an essential protein source today for more than 40% of the global population. And I you you fishing undermines the ability of maritime states to achieve their own domestic food security, which could destabilize fragile economies. It’s also symptomatic of a larger security vulnerability, particularly those who have limited capacity to patrol their maritime domain or apprehend and prosecute criminal actors. I you fishing often happens in concert with other illicit behaviors, including the atrocities of human trafficking and forced labor as well the smuggling of other illegal substances. We become particularly concerned when I, you you is perpetrated or abetted by state actors that may use government resource is to support unlawful fishing operations, encourage or assist their commercial fishing fleets to violate sovereign waters and exclusive economic zones, obtained dubious licensing and other certifications through a legal arrangements with corrupt local officials, or even intimidate legitimate local fishermen using armed vessels and unsafe navigation practices. Despite the enormous challenge, I have great hope that we could make a difference. Working together with our partners because we know international cooperation works for more than a quarter century is 25 years. Six nations which contribute to the enforcement efforts of Operation North Pacific Guard have confronted fishing. Police have failed to adhere to international rules and regulations. Our collective efforts have been overwhelmingly successful, practically eliminating high seas drift net fishing in the North Pacific Ocean. And that collaboration continues today. Just this month, Coast Guard cutter Douglas Monroe, a 300 ft high endurance cutter, completed the North Pacific Guard Patrol, where they conducted at sea inspections of 11 fishing vessels from four different nations across the Pacific. We are working with our like minded partners. Last month, the national security cutter Kimball participated in the multi country Operation Osei throughout Oceania and conducted high seas patrols near American Samoa and Fiji and National Security Security cutter Berkoff, a sister ship, worked alongside the Ecuadorian navy to monitor the behavior of nearly 300 reported Chinese fishing vessels operating on the outskirts of Ecuador’s exclusive economic zone. In the vicinity of the Galapagos Marine Reserve I you actors operate in the shadows but working together as a broad network of partners sharing information, we could spotlight such bad actors, root out their illicit behavior and eradicate this threat to our collective prosperity. World leaders and regional maritime security agencies must not allow the normalization of illegal behavior that erodes responsible maritime governance. The U. S Coast guard will make best use of our collective efforts with our partners to protect sovereignty, support cooperative enforcement of international laws and Dr Stability legitimacy in order. But our commitment to a free and open Indo Pacific goes beyond just countering. Are you fishing? Last year I stated publicly in many forms that the Coast Guard was doubling down on our commitment to the Oceania region. And today I’m renewing that commitment. I recently signed the regional engagement plan for Oceania that alliance Coast Guard activities in the region with foreign policy and national security goals and sets a vision for the Coast Guard to expand our permanent presence and affecting this in the region through expeditionary capabilities. In September, the first of three fast response cutters arrived in Guam. These highly capable platforms replace the aging island class patrol boats and will provide significantly increase capability in range to counter illegal activity, conduct search and rescue and strengthen regional partnerships. And we continue to the deployment of national security cutters to the Pacific in support of combatant commanders to provide unique authorities and capabilities that complement our Department of Defense Forces. Last year, National Security Cutter Stratton patrolled in the Western Pacific in support of the United States. Excuse me, the United Nations Security Council resolution enforcement against illicit ship to ship transfers that violate sanctions against the DPRK, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. This year. National Security cover Monroe participated in RIMPAC, the rim of the Pacific, the largest global naval exercise with nine other nations, the foster and sustained cooperative relationships critical to ensuring the safety of sea lanes and the security of the world’s oceans. These deployments. Conducting maritime defense and security operations with the United States, Indo Pacific Command about regional security cooperation, maintaining strength of maritime partnerships and enhanced security. And lastly, our long term commitment to capacity building in New Pacific spans the range of co starred expertise, including the transferring of excess defense articles participating in multinational security exercises, developing bilateral search and rescue and law enforcement agreements, hosting ship writers and deploying training teams to build proficiency. We are proud to be operating with our Pacific partners for promoting free and open Indo Pacific, where individual sovereignty is paramount and should always be protected. Now I look forward to your questions. Thank you. Thank you, Admiral Schultz. We will now begin the Q and A. You are welcome to raise your hand in the participant box. If you have a question, we can also take written questions in the chat box. The first question is from Owen Churchill from SCMP Owen. We will now on YouTube. Thank you, Jen. And thank you, Admiral. Shots for that most appreciated Just a couple of questions, if I can. On China, Um, I was just curious to hear whether you see, um, when it comes to, are you fishing by Chinese vessels? Whether you see this as a matter of intelligence on the part of China or do you see any evidence off active efforts? Thio either subsidize or coordinate these fishing efforts whether you know directly by the Chinese government or through indirectly through state owned enterprises and such on dense. Secondly, just interested to hear a little bit more about any specific steps. The Coast Guard is taking thio counter Chinese vessels. Are you fishing activities in particular? Thank you. Yeah, Thanks for the question. You bled out a little bit. I lost, I think the operative phrase. But I think I got the general Just what you’re asking for. Let me first and foremost say, you know, this, um coastguards strategic outlook on I you Fishing is not an anti strategy document. I mean, there’s a piece in there. I think it’s it’s recognized across the globe that, you know, the largest distant water fleet in the world is operated by the Chinese. You know, arguably, there’s upwards of 4600 Chinese flag vessels. There’s another you know, 15 16,000 of maybe, uh, opaque flags stating here that that show characteristic Chinese fleet. And it’s it’s a large fleet. You know, we’ve recently seen them operating here off and routinely off of South America. Here I mentioned off the Galapagos Marine Reserve about 350 vessels. So I would say this I would say, Um yeah, we I believe it’s it’s fairly common knowledge that you know China State owned enterprise subsidize some of the distant water. China fishing fleets, China, You know, large scale palladio fishing. I think that za known. I think what we’re looking at is we’re looking for a responsible flag state behavior from any flag state. If you’re the largest, um, flag state here of fishing, distant water fishing. You know, there’s a role there when you’re operating 9000 miles from China off of the Galapagos. You’re a long way for home. I haven’t seen a Chinese enforcement vessel in this hemisphere anytime recently. I think you know, you need to look at that. I think when you look at the the transparency or the lack of transparency around flag states off the western coast of Africa, the eastern coast of Africa ships boats with Chinese characteristics, and now we’re showing a Ghana flag or Senegalese flag. You know, those things require scrutiny and what we’re looking to do. I think there’s a maritime domain awareness element is how do we paint picture of what activities were going on across the world’s oceans to a greater degree than we are today? That’s a partnership between the Coast Guard, other law enforcement and maritime fisheries agencies. I think There’s a partnership with academia and folks that are more expertise in us and Big Data Analytics because we have to see the problem then I think it’s like minded nations getting together and talking to talk about the problem. And I think would that behavior you know, we’ll start to see different behaviors. And we had a national security cut of the birth off operate for a few short days out there with the Ecuadorian Navy in vicinity of that 350 ship fleet off the Galapagos. And, you know, we saw some change behavior with the fleet. We identified about a dozen or so vessels that were showing some characteristics that may have been inconsistent with with sort of their state of behavior. You know, a I s automatic identification system. Transponders not depicting their location may be turned off, or maybe some spoofing where a ship’s location and the transponder didn’t correlate. So we turn that information over to the Ecuadorian Navy were not indicating that Chinese fishing off Latin America South America is illegal. But when it’s, you know, in excess of the of the agreements, when it’s, uh, moves into ah, post nations sees without permission. Then we start to have some props, and we do see indicators, you know, across the globe where some of those behaviors were going on. And, uh, and I think it would be disingenuous to say something that doesn’t point back toe the ships that are Chinese flag or maybe opaquely, uh, showing a different flag. Okay. Thank you, Admiral. I don’t see any other hands raised. Oh, when did you have a follow up to that? Mhm. I not. Not immediately, but I may come back with another one shortly. Thanks. Okay. Any other questions, please raise your hand in the participant field or submit your question in the chat box. We’ll give it another minute. If we don’t have any other questions will conclude the briefing. You know, Amy, just while you wait for question, You know one thing, you know, Why does the us care about this? You know, we are the largest single country market for efficient and fish products, and we’re the third largest wild seafood producer. Fifth largest exporter fishing products. We’re looking for ah, level playing field for R us fishermen. And that starts by knowing you know what fish come into the market, where about a third of the fish that come into the United States through imports, we think potentially linked back to possibly I. You harvesting. So there’s a There’s a domestic peace for us fishermen. We hold them to standards. We want them to compete on a level field. And then there’s a global peace. I think what we see here is, you know, the small, particularly Pacific island nations that today’s focus have very little capacity and capability to protect their own waters. And we’re trying to up the game on that and help them out. And we do that well through capacity building, through relationships, defense articles, regional partnerships. Let me let me pause there. Okay? I’ll do one more call for questions from our participants. Please raise your hand of the participant field. Oh, and I’ll come back to you. Thank you, Jen. Yeah, I follow up. I was looking through the report from From last month on noted that it talked about the some evidence off, um, people’s armed forces maritime militia to using coercive behavior. Thio threaten or coerce fishing legitimate fishing activities of other sovereign states. Andi, I wondered if you had any specific? Um, it’s on. Um, you know, would that would countering those efforts? Would that be something within the coastguards agreement? Or is that a matter for the US Navy? What would be the government’s approach to that? Well, I would say this. So I think first and foremost, you know, I’m biased number 38 year coastguards. And But I’ll tell you, I think you know the world’s best. Coastguards aren’t used as vehicles to run down, you know, disputed fisherman in disputed areas. And I think we see some of the aggressive behaviors. You know, the China Coast Guard, which used to be, uh, under civilian leadership, is now you have been repositioned as of 20 1800 people’s military police, which reports of the triple C essential Communist China government. Um, you know, we see the maritime militia as sort of a third arm of the maritime forces, the P L. A and Navy, the China Coast Guard, this maritime militia You know, that type of antagonistic course of behavior we very much find as problematic. You know, we had to national security cutters in the Indo Pacific region in 2019 stranded Birkoff I alluded to that sort of five month employment sealed the dose about a 10 month period. Did a lot of different things. You know, they did some sanctions work against DPRK. I mentioned that they did capacity building with the Philippines. Malaysians, Indonesians E At the end of the day, are we looking toe Get a Coast Guard cutter, you know, in conflict with the Chinese Coast Guard vessel. I don’t believe that’s the case, but we’re looking to build up the regional capacity, the Asian nations, their naval forces, their maritime forces. How do we strengthen them? How do we work on you know, their skills? We’re doubling down with the Vietnamese that are growing their coast guard fivefold. The Indonesians they’re building out there, uh, become love. Their organization, the Malaysians, um, they’re all very focused on their maritime security forces, and we’ve got a lot of capacity building going on. So I think it’s working with the regional partners to sort of work on the front lines in that part of the world. I mean, behaviors get, you know, draconian, Lee Worse. Um, you know, potentially you see something like that, but I think right now it’s about. It’s elevating people’s knowledge of value fishing its’s building capacity. It’s creating regional forums. And some of that work was on its own. Some of that could be amplified, supported by the coast. I think that’s how we get after the problem on a global scale. And then you call our bad behavior. And I think what we’ve seen is, you know, um, when bad behaviors called out, sometimes it changes those behaviors. Okay. Thank you, sir. I will now take a question from the chat box. This comes from Sarah Nachman Eagle Broadcasting Corporation in the Philippines. Her question is, what is the U. S. Stance on the recent Chinese Philippines fishing dispute? What actions is us planning to take against China? Well, thanks some for that question. I think it’s a bit of a bit of a spin on the last question there, Um, again, the U. S. Government. We’re sort of we’re focused on regional collaboration partnerships, strengthening the metric the Philippine Coast Guard. I visited with them here about a year or so ago and, you know, they’re a coast guard that’s up around around 25,000 strong, with a vision to grow to 35,000 there The Navy, that’s think less than 14,000. They very much see the Coast Guard has a key enabler of their sovereign maritime interest and we’re doing capacity building with them. We’re doing training with them. If you If you left me there, my uniforms looks just like the Philippine Coast Guard uniform. They’re very much modeled after us as sort of what they wanna be in terms of capabilities and authorities. They’ve got tremendous support coming in from Japan Coast Guard in terms of giving them some patrol vessels. They’re working with the French on offshore patrol vessels, requiring a couple of those for them. And I think they got the recent one or once coming shortly. So I think it’s Mawr through that multilateral approach where we’re helping those regional actors versus the Coast Guard United States Coast Guard coming over there and getting, you know, in the middle of a Philippine China Coast Guard dispute over dispute over, you know, an island location of fishing location. Ours would be to enable and bolster their capacity there, sort of fortitude Tutu press back against in this case, if it’s if it’s an aggressive China pressed back against again. I don’t wanna make this anti China is not the case at all. It’s just about protecting sovereign interests in sovereign nations, right to protect their interests, exclusive economic zones. And I you fishing is a direct threat to that. And that’s a That’s a global problem. It’s a global maritime governance problem. That’s where the lens we’re looking through on this, Amy. Okay, I’ll do one last call for questions. You can raise your hand or submit in the chat box. We’ll give it just 30 seconds. Here. There’s a thank you from Sarah, not common in the Philippines. Thank you, sir, for answering that question. Okay, if there are no other questions, I’ll turn it over to the admiral to make any closing remarks, and then we’ll conclude it there. Yeah, No, I would just say in closing. Thanks for the opportunity to to chat with you today, Jen. Thanks for for leading this. I think I said Amy. My apologies, but thanks for pulling this together. Um, you know what? What? What this is all about is the Coast Guard’s been doing fisheries enforcement. Domestic Fisher, important international IOU, Fisher, for we’re up in our game. We think we have a A strong standing here is a maritime agency on the international front. So we’re bringing like minded partners. Um, we have a you know, see that I m o the International Maritime Organization that meets in London here multiple times a year through the subcommittees. And what we’re trying to do is is frame a coherent strategy bringing like minded interest. Draw attention to this to this global problem. You know, 90 plus percent of all the world’s fisheries are what they call over. Fish overexploited, overextended. And that’s a problem, particularly when 40% of the world’s population derives its protein from the sea. So this is about, you know, good governance model, maritime code free and open seas. And we’re excited about being at the table with like minded partners and look forward to the work going forward again. Thanks, Jen, for your help today. Thank you, Admiral Schultz. That concludes today’s briefing. The transcript will be posted within 24 hours on our website. Thank you to all who participated and good afternoon.