UK Independent: 'The US position on the whaling ban is now in flux.'

[seafan]

End of moratorium on whaling threatens more blood in the seas

By Michael McCarthy, Environment Editor

Tuesday, 1 June 2010

The moratorium on commercial whaling, one of the world's major environmental achievements, is in danger of being abandoned after 24 years at a meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) which begins this week in Morocco.

A proposed new deal, which stands a realistic chance of being passed at the conference in Agadir, would allow the three countries which have continued killing the great whales in defiance of the ban – Japan, Norway and Iceland – to recommence whaling legally in return for bringing down their catches.

.....

Should the moratorium be dismantled, it would represent one of the most damaging setbacks ever for wildlife conservation. The ban, which was agreed in 1982 and became operational in 1986, was introduced after a long and intense campaign by environmental pressure groups such as Greenpeace.

They were protesting against the intense cruelty of whaling, where the killing is done by firing explosive harpoons into the large, intelligent animals, and also against the fact that many of the stocks of the great whales had been drastically reduced by over-hunting, with blue whales driven to the brink of extinction.

Although large-scale whaling came to an end with the ban, and populations began to recover, three countries carried on killing: Japan, by labelling its hunting "scientific research", and the Norwegians and Icelanders by lodging formal objections. Since 1986 the three nations have between them killed more than 30,000 whales, the Japanese leading with more than 1,000 whales a year – mainly minke whales, but also Bryde's, fin, sei and sperm whales.

.....

The article further reveals that this "deal" is one of the land mines left behind by our own defiant and formerly convicted Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska.

.....

The deal which may do away with it, which has been on the table for three years, was first thought to be merely a diplomatic compromise to end the perpetual confrontation at IWC meetings between the whaling nations and the anti-whaling countries. But recently it has become clear that it had a different purpose, and was cooked up in the US – by leading figures in the Bush administration, among them being Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska, who, until his conviction for taking unreported gifts in 2008, was the longest-serving Republican senator in American history.

One of the most powerful figures in US politics, Senator Stevens sought a deal with Japan after the Japanese caused problems for the US by objecting (as a bargaining counter in IWC negotiations) to the whale-hunting quota for Alaskan Inuit peoples, who have a traditional hunt for about 50 bowhead whales.

Senator Stevens is believed to have put pressure on the then-US Whaling Commissioner and IWC chairman, William Hogarth – whose budget, in the US National Marine Fisheries Service, Mr Stevens controlled as a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee – to open talks with Japan, which Mr Hogarth duly did at the 2007 IWC meeting in Anchorage, Alaska.

Mr Hogarth's proposals, which would have allowed the Japanese and others to restart whaling commercially, were eventually thrown out by the IWC. Yet the deal now back on the table is essentially a modified version of his original plan, which is even more favourable to the whaling states.

It is notable that the US, which used to have to negotiate its Inuit bowhead quota every five years, will get a 10-year quota if the new deal goes ahead.

.....

On May 24, 16 groups of activists in California raised their voices yet again in opposition to this development.


From the LA Times:

May 24, 2010

The proposal aims to reduce the number of whales killed over 10 years, but opponents say it would reward rogue actions and legitimize hunting endangered species.

"It is a rationale that makes no sense," said Joel R. Reynolds, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council. "Can we stop gang violence by allowing some gang warfare? The answer is no."

Reynolds and other speakers expressed incredulity that the Obama administration helped draft the proposal. As a candidate, Obama promised to strengthen the moratorium.

.....

From the Bodega Bay Press-Democrat:

May 24, 2010

.....

In 2009, Obama said he would firmly oppose whaling, a relief to environmentalists.

But this year his administration has indicated a willingness to compromise, saying it could be a way to get the rebel countries into an agreement on quotas, according to news reports.
Speakers Sunday expressed specific concerns about the gray whale, which showed a population decline a decade ago, according to a Coastwalk press release.

Results of counts under way this year and next won’t be available before the whaling commission’s meeting, Glass said. Coastwalk members feared a decision to allow hunting of the whale could come without knowing the whale’s population.

The Independent concludes:

Not knowing the background, many environmental campaigners have been baffled by the fact that the US, which for decades had been one of whaling's staunchest opponents, seemed to be leading moves to end the moratorium. Now they understand why.

However, although Mr Hogarth's successor as US Whaling Commissioner, Monica Medina, has for months also been pushing the deal hard, President Obama has begun to take an interest in the issue and is understood to have expressed disquiet, and Ms Medina's attitude has shifted.

At a briefing late last week she said that the US could not accept the deal in its present form, but was interested in a new agreement. A close observer of the situation in Washington said: "The US position is now in flux."

.....

The opponents say that legitimising the commercial hunting of whales would open the way to a free-for-all. But, even more, there is no guarantee that the capped quotas would be safe, adequate, or even respected.

One of the world's leading experts on whaling, the British biologist Justin Cooke, who is the representative of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature on the IWC Scientific Committee, took the deal apart in the US Congress, in evidence to the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. Dr Cooke said: "The proposal is disingenuous and I suspect that it will fool many people." It was a scam, he said, in which the calculation of how many whales could be killed was being left to politicians rather than scientists.

The fate of many living things, when left to politicians instead of scientists and peacemakers, appears ultimately destined for incendiary, murderous or petroleum-poisoned catastrophe.




(bold type added)

[sandnsea]

1. Statement from Int Whaling Commission

Regarding the proposal that has the potential to be agreed to by all 88 IWC countries, and significantly decrease the current whaling by Japan, Norway, and Iceland. It would also increase whale conservation plans, put regulators aboard ships and on shore, implement DNA testing, and many other programs to improve the numbers of whales. It would not allow whaling to any additional countries.

http://iwcoffice.org/_documents/commission/future/RevisedPressReleaseMay10.pdf

[ladjf]

2. There should be no "flux" about our policy on whaling.

We,nor any other nation, has any significant need for whale products. Why whales are still being hunted is a mystery to me. The only exception should be small eskimo tribes that subsist from whale hunting.

Whales, as well as ALL sea life, should have a legal estate or status protecting them from plunderers. that, of course, is not about to become a reality. Why, because the ones who profit from
the thefts are the ones controlling the protection laws.

[Imajika]

3. Politicians = the people

"The fate of many living things, when left to politicians instead of scientists and peacemakers, appears ultimately destined for incendiary, murderous or petroleum-poisoned catastrophe."

Politicians in a democratic society are the voice of the people's collective will. You may not agree with what your fellow human beings want, but policy should always be set by politicians and most certainly NOT by "scientists and peacemakers" (unless they are elected).

BTW, scientists create all manner of destruction and peacemakers are quite often so wrong about all sorts of things.