Repeat glass eel trafficker to await trial in prison in Spain
New blow against the illegal trafficking of glass eels from Spain to Asia. The judge of First Instance of Pravia (in the northwestern region of Asturias) sent the eel trader Delfín Jesús G.M. to prison without bail for allegedly smuggling this critically endangered species out of the European Union, using his legal operation as a cover.
The judge took into account the repetition of the crime, as the same businessman had already been arrested some years ago as part of another operation against the illegal sale of eels, which he allegedly continued to export to China as part of an international criminal group. The public prosecutor’s office had requested the measure on the grounds that there was flight risk and a risk of reoffending. Pretrial detentions without bail are reserved for the most serious criminal cases, an uncommon judicial measure – proving that wildlife crimes are not minor crimes, even though they are not always considered as such.
Three other people were arrested during the operation carried out by the Central Operational Environmental Unit (UCOMA) of the Spanish Civil Guard’s Nature Protection Service (Seprona), a specialized police force against environmental and wildlife crimes. They are investigated for the crimes of trafficking in protected species, smuggling, false documentation and belonging to a criminal organization, although the investigation is sealed and ongoing.
More than fifty kilos of European glass eels (Anguilla Anguilla) were seized in the businessman’s industrial warehouse in Soto del Barco, one of the main eel fishing ports in Asturias. They were allegedly prepared to be sent to the Asian market despite the ban on exports and imports of the species from the EU since 2010, according to information published by the regional newspaper El Comercio.
International eel trafficking is one of the largest and most lucrative wildlife crime businesses, according to Europol. In Spain, law enforcement authorities are cracking down hard on these crimes – 20,676 kilos of European eel were seized in 87 cases from 2015 to 2021, according to data provided by the Spanish CITES authority, analysed by WWF Spain and CIEDA-CIEMAT (International Centre for Environmental Law Studies) as part of the LIFE SWiPE project.
Fishing for glass eels is legal in certain regions of Spain, such as Asturias, as is internal trade. According to police investigators, this legal activity serves as a cover for illegal exports outside the EU. The traffickers use increasingly sophisticated tactics to get the glass eels alive to Asia – from sending them inside luggage on regular flights to smuggling them as legal fish cargo. Once in Asia, the juveniles are fattened in fish farms until they become eels, which are exported to markets such as Japan, the US or Canada, with a hefty profit.
But law enforcement efforts are paying off to protect the critically endangered european eel – since Europol’s operation against these crimes was launched in 2016, eel trafficking from Europe has been halved by 50%, according to the EU’s law enforcement agency.
