On 13 November 2013, Dr Jacques Hartmann from Dundee Law School and Dr Michael Waibel from Cambridge Faculty of Law posted a comprehensive analysis on the WTO dispute initiated by Denmark against the EU trade measures against the Faroe Islands, which included a prohibition on imports of herring and mackerel into the EU.
This subsequent post by Hartmann and Waibel, “Mackerel War Called Off?”, focuses on the settlement reached by the EU, Faroe Islands and Norway on 12 March 2014, and questions what this means in legal terms. Since the agreement only deals with mackerel, the WTO complaint and the UNCLOS Annex VII arbitration still continue. Also, because the agreement does not involve Iceland and Russia as parties, the joint agreement has already received severe criticism by the Icelandic Minister of Fisheries and Agriculture for enabling over-fishing.