“The Qatari court examining the case, which earlier posted the final judgment of the case for Thursday, Dec. 2, postponed the verdict for a week because all the defendants were not present in the courtroom. The judge ordered that all defendants should be present when he reads out the verdict next Thursday,” said Jaafar Al-Safwani, deputy chairman of the Fishermen’s Association of the Eastern Province.

Al-Safwani hoped that the Indian fishermen under Saudi sponsorship would be released without any kind of punishment.

The court had released four boats involved in the violation of territorial waters on Nov. 4 and the remaining two boats on Nov. 10.

The owners of the six boats said the prolonged imprisonment of the fishermen is not commensurate with what the fishermen did when they strayed into the neighboring waters by mistake.

“The fishermen have legal papers and licenses from the Department for Fisheries and the Border Guard to fish in the sea. The detention of the fishermen since August has caused us huge financial losses and led to us missing the fishing season," a representative of the sponsors said.

He denied that the fishermen entered Qatari waters deliberately and hoped they would be released without any penalty as they have compiled all legal documents.

Some fishermen told Arab News that they were sometimes forced to enter the territorial waters of neighboring countries in order to bypass areas where entry is restricted because of security reasons and areas in the control of Saudi Aramco, which is carrying out operations in the Arabian Gulf.

On the other hand, the head of citizens’ affairs at the Saudi Embassy in Doha Ali Al-Arjani, warned Saudi fishermen to be careful not to stray into coastal waters of neighboring countries, causing embarrassment to the Saudi government.

An informed source said fishermen have no excuse to stray into foreign territories as they are provided with maps clearly marking the territorial waters of the Kingdom and areas where they are not allowed to fish.

There are over 1,000 fishing boats in the Eastern Province. Last year, 40 fishermen were detained by the Qatari authorities but were freed after fines were paid.