Sydney - Australian police Saturday seized video clips and log books from the militant Sea Shepherd protest ship that clashed with Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean, news reports said Saturday.

Police boarded the Steve Irwin on Friday when it docked at Hobart, Tasmania, and confiscated video, taken from the ship's helicopter, showing a whaler's explosive-tipped harpoon piercing a whale.

"The whale was then pulled alongside the boat and it was shot seven times with a shotgun," Steve Irwin crew member Andrew Perry told Hobart's Mercury newspaper. "It was an incredibly distressing thing to behold. We've never been able to get footage like that before. It's going to be damning."

Steve Irwin captain Paul Watson said he didn't know whether the raid was in response to a complaint by the Japanese or from the Australian government.

"My position is that if they want to put me on trial for anything connected with this, then I'm happy to do it," Watson said. "We're not there protesting, we're down there to stop a blatantly criminal activity, to stop whaling in a whale sanctuary."

He accused the Japanese whalers of violent tactics. "They were frustrated, violent and attacking us," he said.

The Steve Irwin collided with a Japanese vessel February 7 when it tried to get between a harpoon and a whale.

Greens leader Bob Brown said Watson had told him that the Japanese "had used absolutely outrageous tactics, like sound-wave attacks on people in helicopters."

Brown accused the Australian government of acting at the behest of Japanese authorities. "It's an extraordinary raid that defies the imagination," he said.

Japan uses a loophole in the International Whaling Commission rule book to hunt whales for what it calls "scientific" purposes.

Last year Japan said it intended to take almost 1,000 whales this hunting season. The meat ends up in supermarkets. Australia and New Zealand have led international protests against the killing of whales, but have tried to avoid confrontation with top trading partner Japan. (dpa)