Greenpeace is urging the European Union to vote against lifting the current ban on the international trade in whale products at a meeting in Brussels tomorrow, Friday 14th January 2000.
EU representatives (1) are to decide whether or not to vote with Norway and Japan, in favour of lifting the current ban on the trade in whale products at the next meeting of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), to be held in Nairobi, April 2000.
Greenpeace has written to all EU members of CITES, urging them to unanimously reject calls by the Japanese and Norwegian Governments to reduce whale protection measures.
Greenpeace campaigner Richard Page said,
"If Europe doesn't voice its united opposition to lifting the trade ban, the global whaling industry will be re-established. During the last century, the industry devastated whale populations all over the world. Commercial whaling should be consigned to the dustbin of history."
Historically it has been shown that a legal trade in whale meat acts as a catalyst for illegal whaling and illegal trade. Investigations into the Japanese domestic market have shown that some of the whale meat on sale is illegal. DNA testing has revealed meat from endangered species such as blue,fin, sei and humpback for sale even though it is banned. Any legitimisation of commercial whaling would clearly put both endangered and more abundant species at risk.
For the past month, the Greenpeace ship, Arctic Sunrise, has been tracking the Japanese whaling fleet. The fleet has been hunting illegally in the protected Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary in the Antarctic and aims to catch 440 Minke whales this season. Greenpeace activists have been taking non-violent direct action to protect whales by putting themselves in front of the harpoons and their inflatable boats in front of the Japanese catcher ships.
Japan is violating international law by whaling in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary in an attempt to re-open large scale, commercial whaling worldwide. Commercial whaling was banned in 1986 after a vote by the International Whaling Commission (IWC). The ban was agreed because all other attempts to control whaling had failed. (2)
Japan claims that its whaling is 'scientific', even though the IWC's scientists have said that they do not need the data it provides. The meat from whales killed in the 'scientific' hunt is sold on the open market in Japan. (3)
Notes to editors:
(1) All European Union countries are represented at CITES, with the exception of Ireland.
(2) The IWC discovered last year that the Japanese coastal whaling industry had falsified catch records until the IWC's ban on whaling came in to effect. Russian factory ships also took more than 100,000 whales over their quotas.
(3) Japan is also actively lobbying over a dozen developing countries to become members of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) and vote with Japan to resume commercial whaling world-wide in exchange for foreign aid from the Government of Japan.
Further information:
Contact:
Greenpeace press office on 020 7865 8255
