Liu Zhijiang would prefer to talk about the original Rembrandt painting that he treasures and about which he is filming a film, but he urgently needs to clarify
what is happening with his ship
, the powerful fishing boat TAI AN, a 104-meter-long floating factory.
He wants to clarify that his ship did not commit any crime and that those who denounced him for having illegally caught 163 tons of toothfish in the Argentine Sea want to harm him.
“They are three competing companies and they want to harm me,” he insists from an office in Ushuaia and in a video call with
Clarín
.
It is the first time that he speaks and he is accompanied by his lawyer, María Eugenia Chiarvetto.
While he defends himself, the load of hake is paralyzed and frozen in the cold rooms of his boat, which is one of the best in the country.
The fate of all that toothfish is unknown, something like ocean “gold” protected internationally due to its fragility and at the same time highly sought after
in luxury markets
.
The lot that the TAI AN brought back from the last tide, a raid that lasted 45 days, may be worth 4 million dollars.
But Liu doesn't know what will happen yet.
He does not know if he will be able to close the commercial circuit of his business.
He doesn't even know if the national authorities will allow him to set sail again.
“It's all there, they haven't touched anything, we didn't commit a crime, but they have done us enormous damage:
I put the newspapers and I'm everywhere
,” he laments.
Liu Zhijiang, owner of the TAI AN ship, with his lawyer, María Eugenia Chiarvetto, in the interview with Clarín.
Photo: Mario Quinteros.03/22/2024Photo: Rafael Mario Quinteros - FTP CLARIN MRQB-03028.JPG Z
Liu wants to answer everything.
He's grateful to be able to do it.
He needs to make the release of him.
Defend yourself from accusations of environmental disaster.
“There is no disaster,” he points out.
They carried out the inspection, filmed it and leaked that photo of the youth to harm me.
What was caught is not juveniles and those tons are the product of something incidental.
He came out when we picked up the net because he was there.
We cannot know what is under the water when we cast the net,
the sonar does not tell us what you are going to catch.”
He speaks in clear Spanish.
A Castilian built on permanence.
“I arrived in Argentina at a very young age, in 1994, and I was always dedicated to fishing.
The boat is mine, but it has the Argentine flag.
My entire company is Argentine and employs Argentine families.
It is not a Chinese company, it is an Argentine company.
I know each of my employees, their families.
Last year we were awarded for our environmental practices.
Birdwatchers come on my boat.
You have to understand that we do not fish anything illegally as they say.”
Video
Clarín spoke with the owner of the Tai An vessel. What is behind the seizure of 163 tons of toothfish.
Special report by Gonzalo Sánchez
But the question is concrete and is reiterated: Liu is accused of fishing 163 tons of toothfish without a permit. Is this so or not?
“The three companies that denounced Liu are going against the Argentine source of labor,” says lawyer Chiarvetto.
“It is a ship that does not generate waste, that is sustainable and sustainable.
The by catch is incidental.
It happens when you do this activity.
The toothfish is 800 meters deep.
The net that we cast passes at 400 meters.
It was to fish for Polish hake.
"You can't know that there were toothfish living there," she explains.
TAI AN, vessel of controversy.
-But is all that amount incidental?
-Yes it is.
The ship was rented until August 2022. There is a history of other hauls, with 20 tons of incidental.
-But as soon as the protected species is released, shouldn't the practice stop?
-Yes, and you have to run five miles for five days...
-Did the captain do that?
-Yes, he did it under the control of the observers.
But in trawl fishing there is always an incident.
-I return to the question, 163 tons of juveniles?
-No, it is not juvenile, as was said.
It was not downloaded either and there is still not even a record.
No rules were violated.
There is no environmental damage.
Liu takes aim at competing companies.
He asks that his accusers be investigated.
He wonders about the real intention of the complaint.
He says that the government does not accuse him, nor does the fishing authority.
He says that a private individual is denouncing him, who wants to remove him from the game.
The photos that appeared, Liu insists, are not official.
They were made by someone with bad intentions.
He says that they are trout, that they sought to harm him, that nothing is like that.
“I own the boat, it doesn't matter if I have a Rembrandt.
My friends call me to ask me what happened.
There was an inspector.
If the boat catches a lot of juvenile fish, I have to take it back to port.
I can not continue"
-What are the companies that reported it looking for?
-They don't want me to work.
They don't want me to produce.
They want to stop me.
There's something back there.
It is not normal.
They are chasing me.
I'm in all the media, they want to screw me.
I want to work.
-Did you have an authorized quota to fish for toothfish?
-I had it and they took it away from me.
She had filed a complaint to have it returned to me.
I'll explain to you: I went to look for Polish hake, there were black hake in the area.
I don't know why: maybe they get married, have parties, I don't know what the toothfish was doing there.
I threw the net.
We took out 70 tons.
-And they didn't have to stop?
-There was an inspector and she didn't tell me anything.
-But you know that they were above the regulations...
Now Chiarvetto answers for Liu.
He says none of this is either willful or deliberate action.
That the boat always catches bycatch.
It's something that happens.
That the boat sometimes drags the net for up to ten hours.
That the ship reports to the Prefecture every 4 hours.
Everyone knows their position.
That what is caught cannot be thrown into the sea.
What goes out never returns to the sea.
The interview of the owner of the Tai An ship with Clarin, carried out on Friday morning. Photo: Rafael Mario Quinteros
Liu comes back, he wants to explain more.
He clarifies that from his last incursion he returned to port with 3,200 tons: 140 were toothfish.
In other words, he was within the allowed by catch percentage, which is five percent.
The error rate is normal, he almost shouts it.
"If I throw the net I don't see what's below. When I take it out, I see everything," he says, briefly, of course.
-Did you have a quota permit to fish for toothfish?
-Had.
They took it from me...
-No, I repeat the question: did you now, when you entered the sea on this tide, have permission to fish for toothfish?
-No.
-There is a problem there.
-There is a problem.
They took away my permit.
The fee.
There has been a complaint made about this since 2019. What happened now was incidental.
I didn't have permission, but it was incidental.
-Is it true that the governor of Tierra del Fuego made a request for an extra quota of toothfish for the TAI AN?
-He did it on February 5, 2024.
-In other words, Governor Méllela interceded so that you could fish for toothfish.
-Yes, regardless of the incidental.
-Why did the governor do that?
-The motivation was the request of the companies.
We asked him to intercede so as not to have these problems because it had already happened that toothfish had been harvested in the Polish hake areas.
The Polish coexists with the toothfish.
-So you knew that black hake could come out.
-Always works.
But what I caught is within limits.
Liu wants to be understood.
He accepts that he did not have permission to fish, but his vessel was never punished.
She is not a ship with a record.
He says there are no reasons for his cargo to be seized.
They do not hide data.
What is caught is declared because if not, it cannot be exported.
His industry generates a value chain.
He says that the Argentine flag flies on his boat.
He remembers that he arrived in '94. Half of his life, he repeats, was spent in Tierra del Fuego.
That all the capital is his and is Argentine.
Chiarvetto clarifies: Liu liquidates in Argentina, not in China.
He moves personnel, he guarantees their rights.
He finds everything unfair: he does not deny that there has been an incident but they ask to wait for the download to prove that everything is in order.
“Talking about illegal fishing is an act of discrimination.
Today we do not know if the next departure is guaranteed and I have many people who came from the interior of the country to work.
This is all very malicious.
Liu works 15 hours a day, he doesn't deserve to be hurt like that,” says the lawyer.
Liu offers to get on the boat.
Know the job.
The invitation remains open.
He feels that he has been able to express himself.
-Okay, it would be good to see the ship and also see the Rembrandt...
-Next time we talk about Rembrandt: I'm filming a movie... that's more fun than all this.