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These formidable predators in the Mediterranean waters are on the verge of vanishing, with unlawful fishing practices being a major contributor to their rapid population drop.

This conclusion is based on investigations carried out by researchers, who worked alongside an ocean protection organization. They report that some of the most threatened species – such as the great white – are appearing for sale in ports across North Africa.

These sharks are one of over twenty Mediterranean shark species safeguarded by global treaties, which prohibits to catch them or to offer them for sale.

However, by monitoring fishing ports along the Mediterranean coast of North Africa, investigators uncovered that at least 40 great white sharks have been killed there in the single year of 2025.

Footage from social media showing protected sharks being unloaded in North African ports has been independently verified.

One piece of footage showed a sizeable great white shark being hauled ashore from a fishing boat in an Algerian port. Another, recorded in Tunisia, shows remains and fins of what appears to be a protected mako, which is also a threatened and protected species.

Final Refuge

The project head, explained that many shark populations – great whites especially – had declined dramatically in the Mediterranean in recent decades.

"No other sea is fished like the Mediterranean Sea," he said. "The effects of large-scale fishing has been growing... and it's possible that they will vanish in the foreseeable future."

The Mediterranean great whites is now classified as Critically Endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

In their most recent effort to track and analyze the animals, the team worked in the waters between Sicily and North Africa – an area identified as a "key remaining habitat" in the Mediterranean for several threatened shark species.

A primary objective of their expedition was to deploy a tracking device onto a shark – something that has never been done in the Mediterranean Sea.

To attempt this, the researchers used a large amount of fish bait – including baitfish and 500 litres of tuna oil to create a "fat slick" that many sharks can sense from far off.

Despite working for two weeks – laying bait, sampling for DNA to search for shark DNA and using underwater cameras – the researchers failed to encounter any sharks to tag.

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

"It's discouraging," the lead researcher said. "It just shows how degraded this ecosystem is."

As the team searched for surviving sharks, they also were informed that a small great white had been caught and killed in a regional fishery – just 20 nautical miles from where they were working.

It is not clear whether that specimen was ensnared unintentionally in fishing gear, or if it was hunted.

The team, however, calculates that over forty great white sharks have been taken along that coastline. "This is a lot for a critically endangered population," the researcher emphasized.

Illegal Shark Trade

The researchers, along with colleagues in North Africa, are monitoring several fishing ports in the region. Documentation shows that sharks under protection are captured, brought to port, and sold in countries including Tunisia and Algeria.

The protective legislation are multifaceted. Currently, 24 threatened species have treaty-based safeguards – including mako, angel, threshers and hammerheads.

An regional treaty states that those species cannot be "retained on board, transhipped, landed, transferred, stored, sold or displayed or offered for sale".

The agreement specifies "they must be released unharmed and alive [where] possible". Those rules are not designed for accidental bycatch and compliance varies from one place to another.

A expert noted that his own research found several great whites on sale. But, he said, there was a paradoxical element of hope in the fact that white sharks were turning up for sale.

"It shows that there is wildlife left," he said. "And if we can safeguard this, there is a hope for revival."

The Path Forward

In poorer communities in North Africa, fishermen who catch sharks might face the decision of whether to feed their family, or release a protected animal to the ocean.

"Why would they throw sharks back into the sea when they need food for their children?" asked a local expert. "If you support them and train them in more sustainable fishing, they will not catch white sharks."

Another expert added that if countries around the Mediterranean joined forces, "there is hope."

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