Marine wildlife supporters are today celebrating the long-awaited decision to ban the Japanese government from killing whales in the name of research, but the fight isn’t over says a leading environmental activist organisation.
A United Nations court has ruled that the Japanese government’s ‘scientific whaling’ is illegal and that the Japanese must stop its killing of whales in the Antarctic. It’s thought that approximately 3,600 minke whales were killed under this ‘research’ anomaly.
Among other organisations, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has been fighting whaling for more than a decade. Sea Shepherd founder, Paul Watson, says they welcome the ruling but they’ll be monitoring the seas to ensure it is enforced.
“We’ll be preparing the vessels to return to the Southern Ocean in December because, quite frankly, I don’t trust the Japanese to abide by this ruling,” says Watson. “They said they will, but they’ve got a record in the International Whaling Commission of saying one thing and doing another.”
Despite the victory, they’ll be no rest for the Sea Shepherd who are now turning their attention on other massive illegal fishery operations as well as the Western Australian government’s controversial decision to cull sharks off its coast, which Sea Shepherd Australian Director, Bob Brown, has labelled ‘absurd and bloody’.
Bloody ridiculous if you ask us.
Interested in reading more about the Sea Shepherd and its founder? … Captain Paul Watson has been patrolling our seas for more than three decades in his bid to protect marine wildlife from the destruction of man. To some, he’s an environmental icon, a modern-day prophet sent to save our seas and the marine wildlife within them. To others, however, his irreverence for property means he’s something of an eco-terrorist. A man of contradictions, Watson is passionate, authoritative, self-congratulatory and proud.He’s also, as Lisa Louden reports, a fierce protector of an environment being plundered. Read Lisa Louden’s full profile on Paul Watson here.
