Commercial Whaling Ban Condemns Japan's Hunt

Commercial Whaling Ban Condemns Japan's Hunt



IWC Validates Commercial Whaling Ban, Condemns Japan's Hunt 
May 2007 -  The International Whaling 
Commission today re-authorized the existing moratorium on commercial 
whaling that has been in place since 1986. A group of 26 pro-whaling 
nations, including Japan, abstained from the vote. 
The whale conservation majority of 37 countries adopted a resolution 
stating that the whaling ban "remains valid," effectively overturning last 
year's statement by a temporary pro-whaling majority that the moratorium 
was "no longer required." 
Bill Hogarth, director of the U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service, 
chaired the IWC meeting in Anchorage. 
The vote indicates the renewed strength of the anti-whaling group of 
nations, observers said today, the final day of the Commission's four day 
annual meeting, taking place at the Captain Cook Hotel in Anchorage. 
A Japanese government delegate said that the result was "expected but 
regrettable." 
Japan stopped commercial whaling in line with the 1986 moratorium but has 
been hunting whales since 1987 for what it calls scientific research 
purposes. 
Japan's research whaling program in Antarctica's Southern Ocean was 
condemned Wednesday by a majority of the 75 IWC member nations. 
The non-binding resolution proposed by New Zealand was passed with 40 
votes in favor and two against. Again, the group of countries recruited by 
Japan as allies did not participate in the vote. 
Australian Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull, left, discusses whaling 
issues with Japanese IWC Commissioner Joji Morishita at the IWC meeting. 

Japan's first Antarctic Research Program, JARPA, from 1987 to 2005 killed 
nearly 6,800 whales. 
In 2006, Japan opened JARPA II, which calls for the killing of up to 935 
minke whales each year as well as 50 endangered fin whales. Japan plans to 
add 50 endangered humpbacks this year. 
It is this whale hunt that has brought Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd Society 
ships to the Southern Ocean for the past two years in attempts to stop the 
slaughter. A Sea Shepherd vessel tangled with a Japanese whaler in 
December, an incident for which each side blames the other. 
Greenpeace delegation leader Shane Rattenbury said today, "The JARPA II 
programme that began two years ago must be immediately ended before 
thousands more whales die needlessly." 
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society founder Captain Paul Watson, who 
traveled from Australia to attend the IWC meeting, was told to leave the 
Captain Cook Hotel and treatened with criminal tresspass charges if he 
re-entered the building. 

Captain Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society explains his 
organization's position on Japanese whaling to an Anchorage City police 
officer outside the Captain Cook Hotel. 
"I was informed that the Captain Cook Hotel did not welcome certain 
opponents of Japanese whaling operations," said Watson. Dolphin defender 
Ric O'Barry was also denied permission to enter the hotel. 
Japan's research program was criticized by the IWC Scientific Committee 
earlier this week. In its report to the plenary meeting of IWC delegates, 
the Scientific Committee said, there is "little incentive" for Japan to 
produce data collected from its JARPA whaling program and what data has 
been shared, "is of little actual value." 
"It is quite clear from the JARPA review workshop and subsequent 
discussions in the Committee that the 18 year JARPA program involving 
killing 6,796 whales has added little to our understanding of minke whale 
biology or ecology," said the Scientific Committee, comprised of up to 200 
whale biologists, many nominated by IWC member governments. 
IWC members passed a resolution Wednesday that calls on the government of 
Japan to address 31 outstanding recommendations from the Scientific 
Committee and to suspend indefinitely the lethal aspects of its research 
program. 
The resolution recalls that the IWC has repeatedly requested that Japan 
desist from issuing permits to conduct lethal research on whales that are 
protected from commercial whaling. 
It notes that the research conducted during its last phase did not meet 
any of its goals, does not meet any critically important research needs, 
and could have been conducted by non-lethal means. 
Sue Fisher of the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society says Japan is not 
really conducting research. "This hunt under the guise of science is a 
joke, but sadly it is not funny. It is clearly being conducted for 
commercial purposes, despite a declining market in Japan for whale meat 
and thousands of tons of meat from previous hunts stuck in stockpiles." 

A Japanese crew measures the body weight of a minke whale taken from the 
Southern Ocean. 
Any IWC member is allowed to hunt whales for scientific research, but 
whale conservation countries view the size and scope of Japan's whale hunt 
in the Antarctic and north Pacific as outside of what is permitted by the 
IWC's constitution, the International Convention for the Regulation of 
Whaling. 
In other decisions made this week, the IWC turned back the proposal by 
Brazil and Argentina for a Southern Atlantic Whale Sanctuary again. It 
needed a 75 percent majority to pass but managed to secure only 60 percent 
of the vote. 
The current moratorium on commercial whaling does not affect aboriginal 
subsistence whaling and quotas were approved for several countries. 
Greenland's proposal to increase its aboriginal hunt from 175 minkes and 
19 fin whales to 200 minkes, 19 fin whales and two bowheads did obtain a 
75 percent majority in a vote today. 
The original proposal contained a request to take 10 humpbacks as well, 
but this was withdrawn after strong opposition from whale conservation 
countries. 
The issue of Greenland's expanded quota was controversial. Countries 
including the UK, the United States and the Netherlands voted in favor, 
while countries such as Monaco, Germany, France, Australia and New Zealand 
voted against it. Latin American countries such as Brazil, Argentina, and 
Costa Rica abstained from the vote. 
The IWC also renewed aboriginal subsistence Whaling quotas for the Inuit 
peoples of Russia and Alaska, the Makah people of the U.S. state of 
Washington, and for the inhabitants of the Caribbean island nation of St. 
Vincent and The Grenadines. 
Some good news for whale conservation did come out of the IWC meeting. The 
world's largest mammal, the blue whale is slowly recovering from 
commercial whaling, the Scientific Committee said. 

Blue whales weigh between 100 and 120 tons. The primary target species of 
modern whaling, blue whales were reduced in all waters to very low levels 
until protected in the mid-1960s, but are now showing some signs of 
recovery. 
Observations show that the population of blue whales in the Southern 
Hemisphere has grown from a several hundred to a few thousand, and there 
is also a small rise in the population near Iceland. 
Once present by the hundreds of thousands, blue whale numbers are 
currently about 4,500 in all the world's oceans, said the IWC's chief 
scientist Greg Donovan. 
Numbers of other large species such as fin whales and humpbacks are also 
rising in many parts of the world, the Scientific Committee said. 
The Greenpeace delegation is concerned about what was not addressed by the 
IWC commissioners. 
"The functional extinction of an entire species - the Baiji dolphin - got 
just 15 minutes of fame here at the International Whaling Commission 
meeting," the group said. "The Vaquita, the Mexican dolphin likely to 
become extinct in the near future got about as much notice." 
Greenpeace said that during the four days of the IWC meeting an "estimated 
the 3,288 cetaceans" have died worldwide as bycatch in the nets of 
fishermen targeting other species, "plus the incalculable deaths from 
other human causes like ship strikes, pollution, bycatch and climate 
change." But these issues did not come up during the meeting. 
"The survival of the highly endangered Western Pacific grey whale is 
dependent on Japan taking direct and swift action to reduce the numbers of 
these whales dying in fishing nets," said Naoko Funahashi, Japan 
representative of the International Fund for Animal Welfare. 
"Japan must act responsibly," said Funahashi. "It must take action 
urgently to save these whales, or they could be lost forever." 
Calling themselves Teens Against Whaling, three schoolgirls from the 
coastal town of Port Stephens, Australia - Skye Bortoli, Ayesha Future and 
Caitlin Frerk - travelled to Anchorage to present the IWC chairman with a 
petition signed by 40,000 Australians calling for an end to Japan's lethal 
scientific whaling program. 

A humpback whale breaches in the Hawaiian Islands 
"The girls remind us of how the humpbacks have become a cherished part of 
the coastal communities of Australia where they pass on their migration 
from the Antarctic," said Australian Environment Minister Malcolm 
Turnbull, who met with the girls and introduced them to Chairman Hogarth. 
"Perhaps more than anything, these three young ambassadors underline the 
depth of the feeling about whale conservation in Australia," Turnbull 
said. 
Finally, the Commission voted today to hold a special meeting on the 
function and effectiveness of the body as a whole before next year's 
annual meeting in Santiago, Chile. 
Monica Medina, director of the Pew Whale Conservation Project, welcomed 
the decision. "It is clear from this week's meeting that there is general 
agreement among the commissioners that the institution is itself at risk 
of extinction," Medina said. 
"If we can resolve the on-going controversy over commercial whaling," she 
said, "we will be in a better position to address conservation 
comprehensively, and bring the IWC into the 21st century."    

       
      

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