The hardline Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has had three boats, the Steve Irwin, the Bob Barker and the Ady Gil, in Antarctica trying to stop the Japanese whaling fleet from hunting whales.
The $1.5 million Ady Gil, formerly known as Earthrace and skippered by New Zealander Pete Bethune, sank while under tow yesterday morning after it was in a collision with the Japanese security ship Shonan Maru 2.
Each side has blamed the other for the incident in which one crewman aboard the protest boat was injured.
Mr Bethune has asked New Zealand police to arrest the captain of the Shonan Maru 2.
"It's a New Zealand registered vessel and anything that occurs on that vessel is classed as happening within New Zealand territory," he told TVNZ.
A spokesman for police national headquarters said that if an application had been made over the weekend police would not be able to look at it until Monday. Police would have to ascertain if they had jurisdiction in the matter, he said.
The anti-whaling activists have also asked the Dutch public prosecutor to launch a criminal investigation into the clash as the protestors' mother ship, the Steve Irwin, is registered in the Netherlands.
The Institute of Cetacean Research, which represents the Japanese fleet, said its ships had never deliberately rammed a vessel.
Spokesman Glenn Inwood claimed footage of the crash showed the Shonan Maru No 2 was trying to avoid colliding with the Ady Gil.
On its website, the institute said the protestors had apparently abandoned efforts to tow the Ady Gil to port, leaving an oily substance, thought to be fuel, spreading over the sea surface, "raising concerns that Sea Shepherd is willfully polluting the Antarctic environment".
The whalers had retrieved part of the severed Ady Gil hull as well as several arrows.
"Their carrying and possession onboard of a lethal-force weapon makes one ponder whether they would hesitate or not to produce casualties."
Sea Shepherd founder and captain of the Steve Irwin, Paul Watson, said the claims were "bizarre".
He accused New Zealand Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully of endangering the lives of activists in Antarctica by implying that they were trying to kill Japanese whalers.
Mr McCully earlier this week called for restraint from protesters and whalers as New Zealand, Australian and Japanese authorities began an investigation into the incident.
"If people are determined to break the law and determined to kill other people on the high seas, then it is not the responsibility of the New Zealand Government or any other Government to send armed vessels down there or something of that sort to stop them," Mr McCully said in a radio interview.
Mr Watson said he found Mr McCully's remarks "totally offensive" , the New Zealand Herald reported.
"Statements from politicians in Australia and New Zealand have given a green light to the Japanese to do whatever they want to down here."
