The ban on whale-hunting is coming under threat from pro-whaling Japan, which is building support, writes Derek Scallyin Berlin
There was no saving the dead whales dumped in front of Berlin's Brandenburg Gate this week. The small creatures lay motionless on a bed of ice beside equally dead dolphins, giving off an increasingly rotten smell in the 30-degree heat.
What looked like the aftermath of a cross-species suicide pact was, in fact, a media event by environmental campaigners Greenpeace. The 17 carcasses on display last Monday were collected from beaches in France, Britain and Germany, campaigners said, and represent the number of creatures killed every half hour in international waters as a side-effect of commercial fishing.
"In a year, 300,000 whales and dolphins drown in fishing nets and it is impossible to calculate how many more fall victim to pollution, ship strikes, the impacts of sonar or climate change," said Stefanie Werner, of Greenpeace Germany. "How can pro-whaling nations justify hunting them as well?" Monday's meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) in Anchorage, Alaska, promises to be a lively affair.
Japan will make its annual call for the 1986 moratorium on whaling to be lifted. The difference at this year's meeting is that it can build on the support it gained at last year's meeting, when a narrow majority of IWC members supported its resolution saying the moratorium was no longer needed.
"Scientific research has shown that whales consume huge quantities of fish, making the issue a matter of food security for coastal nations," the resolution said. That sparked huge protests from countries that voted against the resolution, while Greenpeace rubbished the resolution's scientific claims.
But the Japanese, who say that hunting and eating whale is part of their culture, will step up their campaign on Monday. Although still short of the three-quarter majority of votes it needs to overturn the moratorium, another simple majority for its resolutions at this year's meeting could help Japan change how the IWC is run.
THE IWC IS an international body with 75 members that sets binding rules on whaling by reviewing and revising the terms of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling, signed in 1946. Its scientific committee provides information on the status of world whale stocks and the commission then votes on its findings.
For years, Japan has been openly critical of what it calls the IWC's conservative whale-counting methods. It is anxious to push for a new long-term strategy for managed whaling rather than an outright ban.
Now both camps at the IWC are locked in a battle to win new members and boost their influence.
The anti-whaling side has just welcomed Croatia, Greece and Israel into its ranks, while Japan has wooed land-locked Laos into its camp.
Although the tiny Asian country has no coastline or history of hunting or eating whale, its government is expected to vote with Japan in favour of lifting the moratorium. Critics suggest its interest in whaling stems from $1 million (€744,000) in aid it received from Tokyo, a charge both sides deny.
Despite the hunting moratorium, limited whaling has continued over the years: Japan is allowed to issue permits to kill 1,000 whales a year for research purposes. Tokyo says the hunting is needed to study feeding and breeding habits; anti-whaling activists object to the practice, pointing out that the whale meat from these mammals is sold for food.
Japan is not alone: Norway has allowed hunting of minke whales since 1993, after a five-year break.
And Iceland resumed commercial whaling last year in defiance of the international ban.
The whaling issue is likely to come to a head next November: if Japan goes ahead with plans for the largest hunt of humpback whales since the 1986 ban, Australian environmental campaigners plan to take the country to an international court.