20 years on and whales are under threat again

[Thom Little]

Dust down the slogan, it's needed once again: Save The Whale. Twenty years on from the introduction of the international whaling moratorium that was supposed to protect them, the great whales face renewed and mortal dangers in 2006.

A double threat is looming for the world's largest mammals, many of them endangered species, in the coming year.

In the biggest whale slaughter for a generation, more than 2,000 animals are likely to be directly hunted by the three countries continuing whaling in defiance of world opinion, Japan, Norway and Iceland. And in a crucial political move, this year the pro-whaling nations look likely to achieve their first majority of votes in whaling's regulatory body, the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

.......

"People should wake up to the scale of what is happening this year," said the whaling campaigner for Greenpeace UK, Willie McKenzie. "Politicians who are supposed to be anti-whaling especially need to wake up to it, and press their governments to put as much effort into saving the world's whale populations as the whaling countries are doing to exploit them."


http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article336084.ece

[acmejack]

1. This is reprehensible.

They are just so lucky I don't own a u-boat...

[Puglover]

2. Jack

I like your thinking.

:toast:

[AngryAmish]

3. If there are hundreds of thousands (or millions) of minke whales

what is the big deal?

[Oerdin]

5. I have to agree.

The hunting is only for those species with large populations and it is carefully monitored with strict catch limits just like hunting of deer or other animals is. The endagered species aren't being hunted. Basially some of the whale species have bounced back so well that over population is becoming a problem thus the new limited hunting season has been put in place. I really don't see what the big deal is about.

[flvegan]

8. You're kidding, right?

You haven't looked into this topic at all, have you?

[greenleaf]

6. With thinking like this,

we're(as HST would have said)fucked.

[SomewhereOutThere424]

7. exactly

I mean it's barbaric. It's unnecessary. It goes against laws that the world is trying to put in place and above all else it's demoralizing to the world around us and human beings as a whole for giving into these practices. So what's the big deal? I mean, we're just spitting in the eye of every living thing around us and making our views of a democracy to 'help' people look like a joke. It isn't like we NEED to stop ourselves from being hypocrites or anything. Like being republican junior is really so bad.

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

Yes, with people who refuse to acknowledge the importance of life, we ARE fucked.

[flvegan]

4. Right now, Japan is whaling in the waters of Antarctica, and 3 vessels

(2 from Greenpeace, 1 from Sea Shepherd) have been chasing them for days...

http://www.seashepherd.org/news/media_051224_1.html

http://oceans.greenpeace.org/en/the-expedition/news/whalers-found
Update, January 1st: It's the seventh day in a row that we have seen no whales transferred to the Nisshin Maru factory ship. The Esperanza continues the chase and with the speed of the pursuit, it's unlikely that whaling is being undertaken: no kills have been witnessed. The Nisshin Maru is now out of the killing zone.

Japan, of course, is whaling in direct violation of the law. As stated by Capt. Paul Watson (Sea Shepherd):

1. The Japanese are whaling in violation of the International Whaling Commission's global moratorium on commercial whaling. The IWC scientific committee does not recognize this bogus research that the Japanese are using as an excuse.

2. The Japanese are killing whales in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary for whales.

3. The Japanese are killing whales unlawfully in the Australian Antarctic Territory

4. The Japanese are targeting fin whales this year and humpback whales next year. These are endangered species and thus this is a violation of CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.

5. The Japanese are in violation of IWC regulation 19. (a) The IWC regulations in the Schedule to the Convention forbid the use of factory ships to process any protected stock: 19. (a) It is forbidden to use a factory ship or a land station for the purpose of treating any whales which are classified as Protection Stocks in paragraph 10. Paragraph 10(c) provides a definition of Protection Stocks and states that Protection Stocks are listed in the Tables of the Schedule. Table 1 lists all the baleen whales, including minke, fin and humpback whales and states that all of them are Protection Stocks.

6. In addition the IWC regulations specifically ban the use of factory ships to process any whales except minke whales: Paragraph 10(d) provides: (d) Notwithstanding the other provisions of paragraph 10 there shall be a moratorium on the taking, killing or treating of whales, except minke whales, by factory ships or whale catchers attached to factory ships. This moratorium applies to sperm whales, killer whales and baleen whales, except minke whales.

[happyslug]

9. Here are the permits by the International Whaling Commission:

http://www.iwcoffice.org/conservation/catches.htm