PARIS — European officials are increasing pressure for an international ban on the commercial fishing of bluefin tuna, a threatened species whose fatty belly is prized for sushi. But they are facing a delicate balancing act as they try to weigh economic interests of a Mediterranean fishing industry, a sushi-loving Japan, and a species that some experts say is on the verge of extinction.
In the latest move toward protecting the fish, France said Wednesday that it would back a ban starting late next year on international trade in bluefin, which are found in the Atlantic as well as the Mediterranean Sea. About 80 percent of the bluefin catch is exported to Japan.
“The species is in difficulty,” Jean-Louis Borloo, the French ecology minister, told journalists in Paris on Wednesday. A ban, he added, is “the most powerful measure possible.”