Japan indicted on Friday a New Zealand anti-whaling activist who boarded a harpoon ship on charges including trespass and assault, the latest chapter in a long-running battle between environmentalists and Japanese whalers.
The activist from the US-based Sea Shepherd Conservation Society boarded the ship in Antarctic waters in February.
Peter Bethune "was indicted on five charges -- trespassing, causing injuries, obstructing commercial activities, vandalism and carrying a weapon," said a spokeswoman at the Tokyo District Court.
Bethune scaled the whaling fleet's security ship the Shonan Maru II from a jet ski before dawn on February 15, allegedly carrying a knife which he used to cut a guard net as he boarded the ship.
The activist was the captain of the Sea Shepherd's powerboat the Ady Gil that was sliced in two in a collision with the Shonan Maru II in January, during a period when the group was harassing the whaling fleet.
Bethune had said he planned to make a citizen's arrest of the ship's captain Hiroyuki Komiya for what he said was the attempted murder of his six crew, and to present him with the bill for the futuristic trimaran.
Instead he was detained, taken to Japan and formally arrested on March 12.
Prosecutors also allege he "inflicted a chemical burn on a Japanese whaler's face by hurling a bottle of butyric acid which smashed aboard the Shonan Maru II" days before he boarded the ship, the prosecution brief said.
The Sea Shepherds describe the projectiles as rancid butter stink bombs.
If found guilty of inflicting bodily injury, Bethune could face up to 15 years in prison, while trespass can carry a three-year jail term.
"Our country will strictly deal with such cases under the law," Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano told reporters, denying any plans to hold out-of-court negotiations with the activist group.
The Sea Shepherds, who have urged Australian police to prosecute the captain and crew of the Shonan Maru II over the collision which led to the sinking of the Ady Gil, described Bethune as a "political prisoner".
"These charges are bogus, and Sea Shepherd Conservation Society questions the credibility of the entire Japanese judicial system for entertaining such absurdities," the group's Australian director Jeff Hansen said.
The new charges were "a further slap in the face to the international community and proof that Japan will continue to do what it wants regardless of international law or public opinion," he said in a statement.
"Illegal whaling operations in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary and the detention of a political prisoner: these things clearly reflect the blatant abuse of and political corruption within Japan's domestic judicial system."
The leader of the Australian Greens, Senator Bob Brown, called for the Japanese whalers to face charges for endangering lives.
"It is absolutely unjust that Captain Pete Bethune is facing up to 15 years in prison in Japan," he said.
Japanese whalers hunt the ocean giants in the name of scientific research under a loophole in a 1986 international moratorium on whaling.
Japan maintains that whaling has been part of its culture for centuries, and does not hide the fact that the whale meat ends up in shops and restaurants.
Australia has threatened to take Tokyo to the International Court of Justice unless it ceases its annual whale hunts in Antarctica by November.
Australia's government this week also expressed alarm at growing support for a plan to allow limited commercial whaling.
Copyright 2010 AFP Asian Edition
