Scallop wars: British and French fishers separated by a shared livelihood
Derek Meredith stares out at the calm, sunny waters of the English Channel, shaking his head. “It’s total anarchy out there,” he says.
Mr. Meredith is a British fisher from Brixham, England, who scouts for scallops near the French coast, and he says his boat has regularly been attacked by French vessels in recent years. He says he’s been the target of flares, rocks, and homemade firebombs during confrontations off the French port of Le Havre, where his trawler is often surrounded by a chain of French fish boats “almost touching each other.”
On the Normandy coast on the other side of the channel, Sophie and David Leroy run five fishing trawlers through their business, Armement Cherbourgeois. And they also feel under siege. In the past two years, they’ve found photos of their trawlers on social media posted by Brixham-based fishers with superimposed black targets and the message
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