Paul Watson

Sea Shepherd's "low profile" campaign to help rescue sea turtles in Jacó recently got nixed by the Costa Rican government when it turned out the conservation group was working without permits.

Celebrity conservationist Paul Watson filed a lawsuit Tuesday against Costa Rica before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, alleging politically-motivated criminal charges.

Paul Watson is fed up with Costa Rica’s attempts to prosecute him. For 13 years, this tiny Central American country that promotes itself as a model of environmental responsibility has tried to put the bushy-haired marine conservationist in jail over an incident that occurred in 2002 in Guatemalan waters.

This year, for the first time, the international conservation group sent a research vessel to help Costa Rican authorities protect humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae), which migrate annually to the shallow waters of Costa Rica’s southern Pacific coast to birth and raise their young.

Named after the Hollywood celebrity who has supported the marine conservation group for two decades, the R/V Martin Sheen is one of the latest additions to Sea Shepherd's global fleet, and it's now in Costa Rica.

If you’ve spent any time on a ship, Raffaella Tolicetti’s descriptions of working a kitchen during rocky seas should sound familiar – although she has the added challenge of cooking while antagonistic vessels attempt to ram each other in Antarctic waters.

Ocean conservationist and Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson started a social media campaign Monday asking followers to write to Costa Rica's new president, Luis Guillermo Solís, and urge that an extradition request be dropped.

One year has passed since 26-year-old sea turtle conservationist Jairo Mora was murdered on Moín Beach, but little has changed for the beach's turtles or those who try to protect them.

He was there, then he wasn't, now he is again.

THE HAGUE – The United Nations' top court on Monday ordered Japan to end its annual Antarctic whale hunt, saying in a landmark ruling that the program was a commercial activity disguised as science.