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Council Regulation (EC) No 1185/2003 of 26 June 2003 on the removal of fins of sharks on board vessels

Type Regulation

Publication 2003-07-04

Last updated 2013-07-06

State In force

Department Council of the European Union

Source EUR-Lex

articles 5

Reform history JSON API

Article 1

Scope

This Regulation shall apply to the removal of shark fins, retention on board, transhipment and landing of sharks or shark fins:

1. by vessels in maritime waters under the sovereignty or the jurisdiction of Member States;

1. by vessels flying the flag or registered in Member States in other maritime waters.

Article 2

Definitions

For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions shall apply:

1. ‘shark fins’ means any fins of sharks including caudal fins, but excluding the pectoral fins of rays, which are a constituent part of raywings;

1. ‘shark’ means any fish of the taxon Elasmobranchii;

Article 3

Prohibitions

It shall be prohibited to remove shark fins on board vessels, and to retain on board, tranship or land shark fins.

1a. Without prejudice to paragraph 1, in order to facilitate on-board storage, shark fins may be partially sliced through and folded against the carcass, but shall not be removed from the carcass before landing.

It shall be prohibited to purchase, offer for sale or sell shark fins which have been removed on board, retained on board, transhipped or landed in contravention of this Regulation.

Article 6

Reports

Where vessels flying the flag of a Member State catch, retain on-board, tranship or land sharks, the flag Member State, in accordance with Council Regulation (EC) No 1224/2009 of 20 November 2009 establishing a Community control system for ensuring compliance with the rules of the common fisheries policy (⁶) and Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 404/2011 of 8 April 2011 laying down detailed rules for the implementation of Council Regulation (EC) No 1224/2009 (⁷), shall send to the Commission, annually, by 1 May, a comprehensive report on its implementation of this Regulation during the previous year. The report shall describe the monitoring by the flag Member State of compliance with this Regulation by its vessels in Union and non-Union waters, and the enforcement measures it has taken in cases of non-compliance. In particular, the flag Member State shall provide all of the following information:

— the number of landings of sharks,

— the number, date and place of the inspections that have been carried out,

— the number and nature of cases of non-compliance detected, including a full identification of the vessel(s) involved and the penalty applied for each case of non-compliance, and

— the total landings by species (weight/number) and by port.

After the submission by Member States of their second annual report in accordance with paragraph 1, the Commission shall, by 1 January 2016, report to the European Parliament and to the Council on the operation of this Regulation and the international developments in this field.

Article 7

Entry into force

This Regulation shall enter into force on the 60th day following that of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.

This Regulation shall be binding in its entirety and directly applicable in all Member States.

(¹)

OJ C 331 E, 31.12.2002, p. 121.

(²) Opinion delivered on 27 March 2003 (not yet published in the Official Journal).

(³)

OJ L 358, 31.12.2002, p. 59.

(⁴)

OJ L 171, 6.7.1994, p. 7.

(⁵)

OJ L 261, 20.10.1993, p. 1. Regulation as last amended by Regulation (EC) No 806/2003 (OJ L 122, 16.5.2003, p. 1).

OJ L 343, 22.12.2009, p. 1.

OJ L 112, 30.4.2011, p. 1.

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