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Moored British fishing boat in the port of Le Havre in northern France
Photo: STEPHANE MAHE / REUTERS
The "Cornelis Gert Jan" was forced to lay in the port of the French coastal town of Le Havre for a week.
Now, according to a court ruling, the British cutter arrested in the context of the fisheries dispute is allowed to leave immediately.
A French court also ruled that the captain does not have to pay a trigger fee for the release, as a lawyer for the skipper announced.
The owner of the cutter had previously threatened to pay a deposit of up to 150,000 euros.
In the dispute between Great Britain and France, there was a court hearing on Wednesday in the port of the French coastal town of Le Havre, where the cutter was detained.
The dispute is about fishing rights after Great Britain leaves the European Union.
France accuses the government in London that French fishermen did not receive the guaranteed licenses to cast their nets in British waters. The UK government denies the allegations. It is about a few dozen boats that have not received a license due to missing documents. Last Wednesday, France arrested the British cutter and warned a second boat because both ships were said to have been sailing in French waters without a license.
France had initially threatened to close ports to British fishermen from Tuesday and to tighten controls on British boats and trucks if there was no agreement by then.
At the weekend there had been no rapprochement between the governments on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Rome.
On Monday evening, however, French President Emmanuel Macron said that his country would initially not implement threatened trade sanctions in order to give negotiators more time to propose new solutions.
fdi / Reuters
