Warsaw, 21 March 1997 (RFE/RL) -- Russian authorities released the Polish trawler Aquarius from detention in a port on the Pacific Coast early today.
Aquarius Captain Stanislaw Szulwinski told our correspondent by telephone that he appeared in court in Petropavlovsk on the Kamchatka Peninsula.
He said the Aquarius is about to leave the port at Petropavlovsk for South Korea. There it will exchange crew.
Poland agreed to meet undisclosed Russian conditions to win the vessel's release. The Polish Foreign Ministry filed an official protest with Moscow yesterday. Russia seized the ship last month ago in the Okhotsk Sea disputing the validity of the Aquarius' fishing permit.