On 7 February 2008 at 01h00, while the Tonnerre, a vessel of the French National Navy, was sailing on the high seas off the coast of Guinea-Conakry, one of its officers spotted a flagless vessel whose captain refrained from answering reconnaissance questions and refused orders to slow down. About half an hour later, crew members on this vessel threw overboard 'a suspicious package of significant size', namely a steel cage filled with bales which, once recovered and subsequently tested, were found to contain more than three tonnes of cocaine. After the vessel, subsequently identified as the Junior flying the Panamanian flag, had stopped, a team from the Tonnerre was authorised by the French military authority to go on board. On 8 February 2008 at 01h07, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs sent the commander of the Tonnerre a telegram confirming the Panamanian flag of the vessel as well as the agreement given by the Panamanian authorities to its boarding and visit. This agreement was formalised by a fax sent on 9 February 2008 through the diplomatic channel, the Panamanian authorities adding that they accepted the transfer of their jurisdictional competence to the French courts to deal with alleged offences of participation in the illicit trafficking of narcotics.

As a result, while sailing at an equal distance from Panama and France, the Junior was diverted on 10 February 2008 to Brest where it landed on 25 February 2008 at 09h45. The public prosecutor of Brest was given all the illicit goods and documents seized and placed under seal, all the minutes noting the acts accomplished within the framework of the procedure, the nine crew members of the Junior and the ship itself. The nine crew members were indicted on charges of offences against the legislation on narcotics and placed in custody.

The crew members appealed, alleging violations of arts 5.1 and 5.3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, art 12 of the Law of 15 July 1994, L 1512-1 of the National Defence Code, art 17 of the Vienna Convention of 20 December 1988, art 108 of UNCLOS, and arts 591 and 593 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

Held: Appeal dismissed.

It follows from the statements of the judgment under appeal and from the procedural documents that on 7 February 2008 at 01h28, an officer from the Tonnerre boarded the Junior, whose name and flag were not known at the time and whose crew was behaving suspiciously, in order to carry out a flag investigation. Even if the vessel's Panamanian flag was discovered at 01h51, the investigation had to be continued in order to verify its veracity in the absence of an up-to-date logbook and administrative and technical documents valid after April 2007. Once the cocaine test carried out on one of the bundles thrown into the sea proved positive, the French authorities, having 'reasonable grounds for believing' the Junior to be engaged in illicit traffic in narcotic drugs by sea, asked the Panamanian authorities for authorisation to board the vessel, to visit it and to take all 'appropriate measures'.

The order to take control of the ship and to search it was given after this authorisation and was justified.