Fed: Govt attacks Japan over whaling record

AAP General News (Australia)
12-02-1999
Fed: Govt attacks Japan over whaling record

CANBERRA, Dec 2 AAP - Australia today condemned Japan's decision to continue whaling
in the Southern Ocean.

Japan defends its whaling on the grounds that it is a scientific program.

"Australia and Japan have cooperated for many years on a range of environmental programs,
such as the conservation of migratory shorebirds, but whale protection is one issue on
which the two countries appear to hold different views," Environment Minister Robert Hill
said in a statement.

"Japanese vessels are moving into the Southern Ocean to commence another whale kill,
despite strong international support for the protection of whales in the Southern Ocean
sanctuary."

An Australian resolution urging Japan to refrain from issuing special permits for scientific
whaling was carried by a large majority at an International Whaling Commission meeting
in Granada last year.

"The scale and nature of the scientific whaling program carried out under permits issued
by the government of Japan, including a clause allowing whales to be processed, undermines
the intent of the International Whaling Commission moratorium on commercial whaling as
well as the claim that they're being killed in the name of science.

"The information sought from the so-called scientific whaling program can be obtained
using non-lethal means," Senator Hill said.

The government was committed to opposing lethal scientific whaling ahead of the 52nd
annual meeting of the commission in Adelaide next year, he said.

AAP lm/mfh/cjh

KEYWORD: WHALE

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