Australia blasts Japan over whales
Date: 04-Mar-02
Country: AUSTRALIA
"Australia has consistently opposed the Japanese 'scientific' whaling program, which has continued despite mounting international criticism," acting Environment Minister Warren Truss said in a statement.
"This 'research' is unnecessary and can be inhumane, and its products end up as whalemeat for sale in Japanese markets."
Truss said Australia would actively oppose the Japanese proposal in May at the IWC's annual meeting, to be held in Japan.
Japan has provoked world outrage for carrying out what it calls scientific research whaling since 1987 after it gave up commercial whaling in line with an international moratorium in 1986. It says the research is designed to gauge how much fish whales consume.
Under a plan submitted to the IWC, Japan's research fleet in the North Pacific plans to catch 50 sei whales in addition to 150 minke whales, 50 Bryde's whales and 10 sperm whales this year.
Japanese officials have said the plan could change based on the outcome of discussions at a meeting of the scientific committee of the IWC from April 25 to May 9 in Shimonoseki in southwestern Japan just ahead of the IWC's annual meeting.
The plan by Japan's Fisheries Agency to add the sei whale to its research whaling program has also angered the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), which considers the 12 to 17 metre pointed-snout sei whales an endangered species.
Japan disputes the WWF's classification of sei whales, which have a grey back and some white on the front belly, saying the endangered species tag is based on obsolete data.
Earlier this year, Japan complained to Canberra when Australian scientists said they had developed a method by which whale eating habits could be determined through scooping faeces from the water, removing the need to kill them for research.