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These formidable predators in the Mediterranean basin are facing a serious threat of extinction, with illegal fishing being a significant driver to their alarming decline.

This finding is based on studies conducted by experts, who partnered with an international conservation charity. They indicate that several critically endangered species – including great white sharks – are being sold in ports across Northern African nations.

These sharks are one of over twenty Mediterranean shark species safeguarded by global treaties, which makes it illegal to target them or to offer them for sale.

However, by surveying docks along the North African Mediterranean shoreline, scientists discovered that at least 40 great white sharks have been slaughtered in that region in just the past year.

Social media clips showing endangered sharks being unloaded in North African ports has been independently verified.

A particular clip showed a big shark being pulled from a boat from a trawler in Algeria. Another, filmed in Tunisia, shows heads and fins of what looks like a mako shark, which is also a protected and endangered species.

Last Shark Stronghold

The lead researcher, explained that many shark populations – white sharks in particular – had plummeted in the Mediterranean in recent decades.

"No other sea is exploited as heavily as the Mediterranean Sea," he said. "The consequences of commercial fishing has been increasing... and it's plausible that they will vanish in the foreseeable future."

The Mediterranean great whites is now listed as Critically Endangered by the key international body.

In their new mission to find and study the predators, the team worked in the Strait of Sicily – an area identified as a "final refuge" in the Mediterranean for several endangered shark species.

One key aim of their expedition was to deploy a tracking device onto a great white – something that has never been done in the Mediterranean Sea.

To try this, the researchers used over three tons of chum – including frozen fish parts and hundreds of liters of scent oil to create a "fat slick" that many sharks can smell from hundreds of metres away.

After two weeks of work – chumming the water, taking samples of seawater to look for genetic material and using underwater cameras – the researchers failed to encounter any specimens.

They captured only a brief glimpse of one blue shark on their cameras.

"It's disheartening," the lead researcher said. "It just shows how degraded this marine environment is."

During their search for surviving sharks, they also were informed that a juvenile great white had been taken in a North African fishery – just 20 nautical miles from where they were working.

It is unknown whether that specimen was caught by accident in gear, or if it was hunted.

The team, however, calculates that in excess of 40 great white sharks have been harvested in that area. "This is a lot for a critically endangered population," the researcher emphasized.

Protected Sharks Traded

The researchers, along with colleagues in North Africa, are keeping watch on multiple ports in the region. Findings shows that protected sharks are captured, brought to port, and sold in countries including the region.

The rules that protect sharks are complex. Currently, two dozen endangered species have international legal protection – such as makos, angel sharks, threshers, and hammerheads.

An multinational pact states that those species cannot be "kept on boats, transferred, landed, stored, or sold".

The agreement states "they must be released unharmed and alive [where] possible". Those rules do not address incidental capture and compliance varies from nation to nation.

A marine advocate noted that his own investigation found multiple white sharks on sale. But, he said, there was a seeming silver lining in the fact that white sharks were appearing in trade.

"It shows that there is wildlife left," he said. "And if we can preserve this, there is a possibility of comeback."

What Can Be Done?

In poorer communities in North Africa, fishing communities who catch sharks might face the dilemma of whether to provide for their families, or throw back an endangered shark to the ocean.

"Why would they throw sharks back into the sea when they must feed their households?" asked a scientist. "If you provide alternatives and education in more sustainable fishing, they will not catch protected species."

An advocate added that if countries around the Mediterranean collaborated, "there is hope."

"But," he continued, "we've got to act very quickly."