Bite Back - Shame of Japan
Following up slightly from my previous post about the dolphin slaughter in some towns in Japan, my attention was turned this morning to whaling, something that Japan is doing far too much of (in my opinion) 
in the name of scientific research. Incidentally, the Japanese must now be the most whale-savvy nation in the world - I’d love to know the things they have discovered and what their current lines of research are with the whales they catch and kill. This particular article I will quote about whalers in Japan and other countries has been take from the excellent dive news site, www.divemagazine.co.uk, and credit should go there, and to the author John Nightingale, for this. I’m just trying to pass on an important story and message for everyone. Please post your comments here and/or on the forum over at Dive Magazine. So without further adue, here is the article:
Five hundred tons of whale meat, part of the harvest from Japan’s whaling operation in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, appears to have mysteriously disappeared. The likely explanation seems to be that it was dumped overboard rather than brought back to be added to the growing whale meat mountain in Japan. Despite government efforts to persuade people to eat it (see right), demand for whale meat is at an all-time low and the price has fallen by almost 40 per cent over the past dozen years. So entrenched have the Japanese policy-makers become over this issue, that Japan decided to increase rather than decrease her ‘allocation’ and went on to slaughter 854 minkes and ten fin whales last year.
Eight out of the ten great whale species were driven to commercial extinction by whaling operations before the International Whaling Commission (IWC) moratorium came into force in 1986, and in 1994 the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary was set up in the hope that those species might get a chance to recover. Only Japan refused to recognise the sanctuary and continues to this day to send her whaling fleet into the reserve, ludicrously claiming that the whales are killed for ’scientific purposes’.
Iceland’s decision to resume commercial whaling also appears to have run into problems, with growing international condemnation of that decision affecting both her tourism and foreign commerce. A substantial email campaign, along with boycotts of Icelandic goods, are having their effect and a number of Iceland’s top businessmen and bankers have openly criticised the government for tarnishing Iceland’s image abroad, describing the return to whaling as ‘a fiasco’. If you want to add your voice to the campaign contact the Icelandic ambassador Gunnlaugsson on icemb.london@utn.stjr.is and Iceland’s Prime Minister Geir Haarde on postur@for.stjr.is
The British government has launched an initiative to persuade more nations to support the IWC’s moratorium on whaling. It is endorsed by the likes of David Attenborough and Tony Blair, who urged governments ‘to ensure that our generation meets its global responsibilities to protect whales’.
Nothing better illustrates the absurdity of Japan’s position than that pile of unwanted whale meat, presently standing at 4,700 tons. The decision to send boats into a whale sanctuary to hunt an endangered species, and to then simply dump the meat overboard, should fill the Japanese government with shame. The official website of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his cabinet invites you to comment on their administration at www.kantei.go.jp/foreign/forms/comment.html which would be a good place to let them know about your feelings on their whaling policies.
Please note that this photo is from the Faroe Islands, not Japan
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