Australia says will not accept commercial whaling plan

Yahoo News 2 Apr 10;

SYDNEY (AFP) – Australia has expressed alarm at growing support for a plan to allow limited commercial whaling, saying it could not accept the proposal before the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

New Zealand, which also opposes whaling, is supporting moves to allow restricted commercial hunts over the next 10 years if it means a big cut to the number of whales currently killed by Iceland, Norway and Japan.

But Environment Minister Peter Garrett said Australia, which has threatened to take Tokyo to the International Court of Justice unless it ceases its annual whale hunts in Antarctica by November, would not accept the deal.

"I am alarmed and very concerned that New Zealand would support a proposal that is flawed and represents a huge compromise to pro-whaling nations," Garrett said.

"Australia cannot support the 'compromise package' now being discussed in the IWC," he told reporters on Thursday.

Garrett said the approach under consideration, which would allow Japan, Norway and Iceland to conduct commercial whaling in exchange for taking a significantly lower catch, was loaded in favour of whaling nations.

"It demands too many first order concessions from those of us who are committed to bringing an end to whaling," he said.

Under an IWC moratorium introduced in 1986, commercial whaling was suspended, but Iceland and Norway ignore the edict while Japan uses a loophole allowing lethal scientific research.

New Zealand's representative to the IWC, Geoffrey Palmer, said Thursday the ban had been unable to stop the growing slaughter of whales and called for a new approach which could drastically reduce the number of animals killed.

"An emotional attachment to a moratorium that is not working is not in my view realistic," said the former New Zealand prime minister, who chairs an IWC group trying to negotiate a deal.

Australia said ahead of IWC talks in the United States last month that the commercial whaling proposal was unacceptable as it did not stop Japanese whaling in the Antarctic.

Activists in Netherlands block whale meat heading for Japan
Yahoo News 2 Apr 10;

THE HAGUE (AFP) – Greenpeace activists chained themselves to the mooring ropes of a ship in the Netherlands Friday to stop it transporting a cargo of whale meat to Japan, police and the environmental group said.

Protesters took the action at 4:30 am (0230 GMT) against a Panamanian-flaggged vessel docked at Rotterdam which was carrying seven containers of meat from Iceland, said Greenpeace organiser Pavel Klinckhamers.

Police detached the activists more than seven hours later, Rotterdam police spokesman Tinet Dejonge said, adding that they had been interviewed and would have to pay a fine.

Greenpeace said 15 protesters were involved while police said there were only seven activists.

"Greenpeace has received assurances from Rotterdam police that the containers in which the whale meat is kept will not leave the port" following a decision by the vessel's owner, the group said in a statement.

The ship is carrying 160 tonnes of meat from 13 endangered fin whales, the group said on its website.

The vessel was due to leave Rotterdam for Japan on Friday at 6:00 pm (1600 GMT), said police spokesman Dejonge.

The protest came on the day that Japan indicted a New Zealand activist who boarded a harpoon ship on charges including trespass and assault, the latest chapter in a long battle between environmentalists and Japanese whalers.

Iceland and Norway are the only two countries in the world that now authorise commercial whaling, while Japan officially allows whaling for scientific purposes, but the meat is then sold to restaurants and supermarkets.