Anti-whaling campaigner takes aim at Nova Scotia’s Whale Sanctuary Project

Paul Watson poses after an interview on Wednesday, July 23, 2025 in Paris. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP-Thomas Padilla

HALIFAX — A bid by a U.S.-based group to bring two captive killer whales from France to a proposed seaside refuge in Nova Scotia is facing fresh criticism from a well-known but polarizing anti-whaling campaigner.

Paul Watson, 75-year-old founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, says he’s opposed to the Whale Sanctuary Project’s plans to place orcas Wikie and Keijo in a huge, floating pen near Wine Harbour, N.S., before the end of this summer.

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“Transferring Keijo and Wikie to Nova Scotia risks their lives,” Watson, who is originally from Toronto, said in a statement released Monday. “If they die prematurely in Canada, the French government … will be held accountable.”

Watson took aim at the project during a meeting in Paris that brought together a committee of government officials and whale experts, as well as representatives from the non-profit Whale Sanctuary Project and Spain’s Loro Parque zoo on the Canary Islands.

The French government is also considering sending the whales to the zoo on Spain’s Tenerife Island, a move supported by the whales’ owners at the shuttered Marineland Antibes park in the south of France.

Watson, now a director of Sea Shepherd France, told the committee that the Whale Sanctuary Project lacks funding, has an unrealistic timeline and plans to build in a bay that he says will be too cold for the two whales, both of which were born in the French marine park on the Mediterranean Sea’s north shore.

“Having grown up in the Canadian Maritimes, I can attest to the harshness of its winters,” Watson said in his statement, referring to the fact that his family moved to southwestern New Brunswick when he was very young.

Those behind the Whale Sanctuary Project have argued the whales will get used to the colder weather because Wikie, Keijo’s mother, is a descendant of Icelandic orcas.

As for the WSP’s cash flow, project CEO Charles Vinick has said more private donors are expected to come forward now that the two whales are potential candidates for transfer. And he has insisted the summertime deadline is realistic.

Meanwhile, Watson says frequent storms and the accumulation of ice floes along Nova Scotia’s eastern coastline could present a threat to the project’s nets and other infrastructure. He also called attention to opposition from some adjacent landowners in Wine Harbour.

Vinick has said the WSP has conducted extensive studies showing the chosen bay, about a three-hour drive east of Halifax, is adequately sheltered from the North Atlantic.

Watson suggested the whales should be placed in a refuge on the Mediterranean coast. But nothing of that sort exists in that region or anywhere else in Europe.

“The project would be eligible for European Union funding, reducing reliance on uncertain private donations,” Watson said, adding that Sea Shepherd France is prepared to commit more than $800,000 annually to support Keijo and Wikie’s care at Marineland Antibes until a European sanctuary is built.

“This is not just about two orcas. It is about France’s commitment to ethical leadership,” Watson said. “The public demands a humane solution. And the science is clear: Nova Scotia is not safe for Keijo and Wikie.”

On Tuesday, the Whale Sanctuary Project issued a statement saying construction at the site is set to begin “when weather permits.” The deadline for completion is now “the second half of 2026.” And Vinick cited a recent statement from the French government indicating it views the project as the “only ethical, credible and legally compliant solution.”

Watson, 75, is perhaps best known for leading dangerous confrontations with whaling vessels on the high seas, which has won him support from celebrities and earned him a spot on the reality-TV show “Whale Wars.”

In July of last year, the international policing agency Interpol removed Watson from its most-wanted list.

He was wanted in Japan following an encounter with a whaling research ship in 2010. At the time, he was accused of ordering the captain of his ship to throw explosives at the other vessel, an accusation Watson has denied.

Still, he was jailed for several months last year in Greenland.

Interpol said the decision to remove Watson from its wanted list did not reflect any judgment on the merits of the case in Japan. The agency, based in France, said an independent review found Japan’s involvement in the case may have demonstrated “the existence of political elements around the case.”

By Michael MacDonald

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 17, 2026.