Bob Brown calls on fellow Tasmanian, Queen Mary, after whaling activist Paul Watson’s arrest

Former senator Bob Brown has urged Tasmanian-born Queen Mary of Denmark to intervene on behalf of high-profile anti-whaling campaigner Paul Watson after his arrest in Greenland.

The Hobart-based Sea Shepherd founder was taken into custody by police when his ship, the John Paul DeJoria, docked in Danish-controlled Greenland’s Nuuk harbour on July 21.

A local court ordered that he be detained until August 15, after a Japanese notice for his arrest was issued through Interpol.

Mr Brown said the case would shame Copenhagen in the eyes of the world “if it acts as the lickspittle of Tokyo, whose cruel and bloody whaling in Antarctic waters ended in 2014 because it was found to be illegal by the International Court of Justice”.

“I am well aware of the constitutional restraints on the monarchy in Denmark,” he said.

“But there is enormous respect for Her Majesty Queen Mary here in her native Tasmania and, at the same time, huge support for Watson, who was pivotal to getting the illegal Japanese whale-killers out of our oceans.”

In his letter to the Queen, the former Greens leader writes that most Australians supported Captain Watson’s efforts to end the cruel and illegal whale slaughter.

“We owe him a great debt,” he wrote.

“I am drawing his plight to your attention so that you may know about the need to gain his release. Japan has withdrawn from the International Whaling Commission and has a new whaling vessel capable of resuming whaling in the south again.”

In 2008, the Australian Federal Court ruled that the Japanese whaling was a criminal activity.

The Captain Paul Watson Foundation uses “aggressive non-violence” to protect whales and other marine life.

More than a dozen Danish police and SWAT team members boarded the John Paul DeJoria last month and a handcuffed Capt Watson was led off of the ship.

The vessel had stopped in Greenland to refuel, en route to the Northwest Passage on a mission to intercept Japan’s newly-built factory whaling ship Kangei Maru in the North Pacific.

The arrest was believed to be related to a former ‘red notice’ issued for Capt Watson’s previous anti-whaling interventions in the Antarctic region, the foundation’s Ship Operations Director, Locky MacLean, said.

Japan’s Antarctic research whaling program JARPA was declared illegal by the International Court of Justice in 2014.

“We’re completely shocked, as the red notice had disappeared a few months ago,” Mr MacLean said.

“We understand now that Japan made it confidential to lure Paul into a false sense of security.”

Mr McLean said the foundation was imploring the Danish government to release Capt Watson and not to entertain a politically motivated request.

He said the crew and foundation had no way to contact Capt Watson, who is a Canadian-American citizen, and it had received no updates.

It was not known whether Denmark would allow him to be extradited to Japan.