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Saturday December 1 2018 | the times
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the times | Saturday December 1 2018
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MARTIN SAMMTLEBEN; GETTY
Fears for Arctic life as cruise ships bring in tourist hordes some cruise companies are forecasting 40 per cent growth by 2020. Now MPs are calling for cruise ships When a guard from a German cruise ship shot dead a polar bear in self- carrying more than 500 people to be defence this summer, the rapidly banned from the Arctic. Ships of that expanding Arctic cruise industry size are already banned from conducting any landings in the Antarctic. dismissed it as an isolated incident. The environmental audit comCruise lines sell the chance to mittee heard evidence that see Arctic wildlife and claim Cruises very large cruise ships they can do so without criss-cross the with up to 6,000 pascausing harm. Arctic Ocean sengers were “dockHowever, many Alaska ing in small Arctic Inuit and other incommunities and digenous people overwhelming who have inhabitPond them”. It wants the ed the Arctic for Inlet government to millennia are Greenland use its observer deeply worried. status on the ArcTourists buy Baffin tic Council to press souvenirs and bring Island Route of first for a ban by the income but also a Northwest Passage members with terrigrowing threat of cruise in 2016 torial claims over the sewage and heavy fuel region: Canada, Denmark, oil pollution as well as the Finland, Iceland, Norway, disturbance and destruction of wildlife, such as ships striking whales in Russia, Sweden and the United States. The committee concluded: “There is narrow channels. Shrinking sea ice is allowing larger a risk that the thousands of tourists who cruise ships to venture farther into the travel to see a pristine, remote and unArctic Circle to places previously only spoilt Arctic landscape are contributing visited by specially adapted smaller to degradation of the very environment vessels. The number of cruise passen- they came to see, and increased tourgers visiting the Arctic grew from ism can disrupt traditional ways of life.” Residents of Nunavut in the Canadi50,000 in 2005 to 80,000 in 2016 and
Ben Webster Oceans Correspondent
an Arctic complained last year that cruise ships were disturbing whales and nesting seabirds and undermining the Inuit way of life. Abraham Kublu, a member of the council of Pond Inlet on the northern tip of Baffin Island, told a hearing on Arctic development: “The cruise ships are disturbing many wildlife as they travel. We have stressed that cruise ships be restricted, but there is no response from anybody. They come and go as they please. This is regrettable and unfortunate. We have no voice.” James Ford, professor of climate change adaptation at the University of Leeds, said that cruise ships could bring commercial benefits to Arctic ports but they also overwhelmed them. He said that the cruise industry was promoting “last chance tourism” to see glaciers before they melted and wildlife before it disappeared, but the Arctic was not ready to accommodate the increase in visitors. Cruise passengers could also be at risk because there was “very little capability to respond to a mass casualty incident in the Arctic”. “It’s mostly local communities who would have to send out a rescue party and they only have small boats. Getting a Hercules plane there would take seven to eight hours,” he said. The Association
British student held in Egypt for ‘spying’ Gabriella Swerling Northern Correspondent Magdy Samaan Cairo
of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators said that the size of ship was not a problem as long as visits were well managed. Carnival UK, which next summer will send two cruise ships into the Arctic — the Queen Elizabeth to Anchorage and the Oriana to Svalbard — said that it used less polluting marine gasoil in the Arctic. Tim Soper, a polar travel expert who oversaw the first voyage through the Northwest Passage by a large cruise ship in 2016, said the 1,000 passengers on the Crystal Serenity had been taken ashore to Arctic villages up to 200 at a time to avoid overwhelming them. He said that the passengers, who had paid between £15,000 and £80,000 per person for the 32-day voyage, were asked not to use mobile phones to avoid clogging local networks and avoid emptying local shops of essential goods that might not be restocked for a year. Kelvin Murray, a colleague of Mr Soper at Eyos Expeditions, said that cruise ships accounted for a very small proportion of large vessels visiting the Arctic and there were many more tankers and ore transporters. He said the Arctic required careful, considered protection but added that the majority of visitors “walk away as an ambassador for these places”. Leading article, page 33
News
IMAGES
The cruise ship Fram visits Svalbard in
Norway. The shooting of a polar bear by a cruise ship guard caused controversy but visitors bring income to Inuit villages
A British teenager is being held in an Egyptian prison for allegedly spying on the military by taking a photo at an airport. Muhammed Fathi Abulkasem, 19, was travelling to visit friends when he was arrested at Alexandria airport on Tuesday. The student, from Cheetham Hill, Manchester, has been accused of “collecting information on a military facility”, his family says. Mr Abulkasem, who has dual British and Libyan nationality, was travelling from Libya to Egypt with a Libyan friend. He took a photograph from the aircraft window at the request of his sister, who is 13, to prove that he had landed. A military helicopter was visible in the picture, his family says. He was questioned by authorities at the airport who examined his phone and discovered the photograph. His cousin, Shareen Nawaz, 34, an aid worker from Wilmslow, Cheshire, described Mr Abulkasem as “soft and compassionate” and said his family fear that he will be sentenced to life in prison. “Everything is happening so fast. All within a few days he is in court. His parents are going out of their minds,” she added. Mr Abulkasem and his friend, who was also arrested, were supposed to be
sentenced on Thursday but the legal process has “got delayed”, Ms Nawaz said. “All they’ve said is that it’s been delayed for review by military courts. It’s just a waiting game,” she said. “We haven’t spoken to him at all. After the first few phone calls the solicitor said he was doing OK and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office said they sent someone over. “They mentioned he has not asked for any medical assistance but, mentally speaking, I don’t know what he’s Muhammed Fathi Abulkasem was held in Alexandria
going through.” Mr Abulkasem and his family moved to Libya recently to support an elderly relative. A Foreign Office spokesman said: “We are seeking more information from the Egyptian authorities following the arrest of a British person in Alexandria, as well as permission for consular access.” Mohammed Alghandour, a former legal representative for the family in Egypt, said yesterday that Mr Abulkasem was being detained in a police station in Alexandria. A spokesman for the Egyptian military declined to comment.