The Irrational Wacky Comedy Meeting - International Whaling report - Capt Paul Watson

[Annces]

The 59th International Whaling Commission Meeting (May 31 to June 3, 2007) - Anchorage, Alaska
Report from Captain Paul Watson



I have not attended a meeting of the International Whaling Commission since 1997. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has in fact been officially prohibited from attending the IWC meetings since 1987 after Iceland protested against Sea Shepherd's enforcement of the global moratorium on commercial whaling in November 1986 when we sank half the Icelandic whaling fleet at dockside in Reykjavik harbour, an action for which we have absolutely no apologies. Protests were somewhat low-key this year, certainly a far cry from the early Eighties when Japanese whaling delegates were routinely showered in blood and giant whale balloons were paraded in the streets. However Australia demonstrated their concerns in the personage of three little girls, a world class surfer, a whale artist and a genuine professional mermaid.

Greenpeace had set up a tent with the strange name of Whale Broadcasting Corporation and a banner that said Stop Commercial Whaling. This was to show they had nothing against aboriginal or coastal whaling by Japanese whaling villages. When I visited their tent I found the atmosphere was so decidedly chilly that Sea Shepherd crewmember Shannon Mann and I left quite quickly – hey we know when we're not welcome.

On the first day of the meeting the pro-whaling and anti-whaling factions pretended to be the best of friends. This soon turned sour when it became apparent that Japan was attempting to use their intent to slaughter fifty endangered Humpbacks as an extortionist ploy to open up commercial Japanese coastal whaling operations. The Japanese said they were quite willing to take their quota of fifty Antarctic Humpbacks off the table in return for permission to have Japanese coastal villages kill whales. They said that since Alaskan natives were allowed to kill whales, they should be also. The difference of course was between subsistence hunting by the Inuit and Yupik and commercial hunting by the Japanese, a very notable distinction that would open up commercial whaling activities in breach of the 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling. The pro-whaling nations were having none of it and voted the Japanese request down.

Japan and New Zealand co-sponsored the resolution to condemn Sea Shepherd and Greenpeace actions in the Southern Oceans. It was a one-sided debate. The Japanese presented their "evidence" that Sea Shepherd had rammed their vessels and Sea Shepherd was not allowed to present our side of the affair despite the fact that an Australian Federal Police forensic team has investigated the incident and the results of the investigation backed the Sea Shepherd position that it was the Japanese vessel that rammed the Sea Shepherd vessel. Hell if we had rammed them we would have proudly said so.
Not much was said about the fact that an unsafe Japanese floating factory filled with chemicals and fuel oil had presented a clear and dangerous threat to the largest Adelie penguin colony in Antarctica. Nor did anyone point out that this was the second time the Nisshin Maru had suffered a major catastrophic fire in the last 10 years.


Finally, Great Britain spoke up to remind the delegates that the death of the whaler had not a thing to do with Sea Shepherd interventions and that the Sea Shepherd ships were hundreds of miles away when the fire broke out. Despite this, Great Britain joined in consensus with all the member nations to condemn Sea Shepherd nonetheless. I wish some of that angry indignation could have been directed at Japan for their callous and cruel murder of the hundreds of intelligent, socially complex sentient beings that we call whales.

The IWC has already demonstrated that they are a toothless organization. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has long suggested that the IWC must evolve from an organization that manages the whaling industry to an organization that protects and conserves whale populations. In fact all of the efforts of the IWC should go towards regulating whale watching, whale sanctuaries and dealing with threats to the survival of the whales like pollution, habitat destruction and harassment and slaughter. The IWC should also be a body that protects small cetaceans like dolphins, pilot whales and orcas. All I know is that the moratorium against Antarctic whaling stands and so-called research whaling by Japan in the Antarctic Whaling Sanctuary was condemned and therefore we have once again been given a clear mandate by the IWC to return to the remote waters of the Antarctic Whale Sanctuary to once again hunt down, intervene, harass and oppose the continued illegal whaling activities by the Japanese whaling fleet.

Full article
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http://www.channelg.tv/video.php?project_id=46

[Bonobo]

1. He's a liar.

"Hell if we had rammed them we would have proudly said so. "

He did ram them. He lied about it. There is video. It is conclusive.