Japan can't hide from brutal reality - whale slaughter

[Annces]

Editorial:

That is why the Japanese have attacked the Australian Government for releasing pictures of the slaughter of whales in the Southern Ocean, including a grisly image of a female minke whale and a calf being hauled aboard the Yushin Maru No 2. That is why there was no whaling while protest ships shadowed the Japanese fleet. The reality is that Japan's actions in Antarctic waters are shameful, and that the more the world sees of the slaughter the louder the outcry will be.

Australian Environment Minister Peter Garrett said he had "a bit of a sick feeling as well as a sense of sadness" when he saw the photographs. It is hard to imagine any other reaction to images of the dead and dying whales, and that is why the Japanese are so anxious that they are left to carry out their brutal business unobserved, and why they quibble over the relationship between the two whales they killed. That is also why they continue the pretence that their operations in the Southern Oceans are about science. They are not. They are about keeping whale meat on Japanese plates.


Rightly, Japan is paying a high price. Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda has had to mount a rare public defence of the programme in what is seen as a sign of growing domestic sensitivity over the international reaction.

That is why there must be no letup in opposition. More than 13,000 people have signed The Dominion Post petition, which will soon be presented to the Japanese embassy. That should be taken by the Japanese as an indication that persisting with whaling will cost Japan a good measure of its carefully cultivated reputation as a good international citizen.

Australian politicians have done the right thing in continuing to expose Japan's Southern Ocean activities, and continuing to criticise them. By that standard, the New Zealand Government's response has been lame. With the end of the whaling season approaching and the focus shifting to the next meeting of the International Whaling Commission, New Zealand's politicians should be making sure that the Japanese understand how strongly Kiwis oppose the slaughter. It is time for them to dispense with the diplomatic niceties.





http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/dominionpost/4401540a6483.html


Sea Shepherd Returns

Activist group Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has resumed its hunt for the Japanese whaling fleet. The group's ship, Steve Irwin, left Melbourne last night for a second stint in the Southern Ocean after a two-week stopover to refuel and replace some of the crew.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/4401656a7693.html

[flvegan]

1. Run 'em down, Sea Shepherd.

Go ahead, whalers...further into debt, further into disdain...

In another week, you'll be the hunted...and you'll run. How does that fear feel?

Fucking cowards.