scooter
07-01-2008, 06:38 AM
Whales emerged the big losers as a week long International Whaling Commission meeting wrapped up in Chile yesterday, conservation groups said after anti-whaling nations failed to halt No. 1 hunter Japan.
Anti-whale hunting nations led by Australia have voiced deep concern at Japan's skirting a non-binding 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling by killing hundreds of whales each year in the name of scientific research.
Japan says that it is unhappy with the moratorium and wants to resume commercial whaling, though detractors say it is already doing so in all but name.
The issue has generated so much tension that IWC chairperson Bill Hogarth, seeking to avoid confrontation, set up a working group to try to build consensus over the next year.
But that step, with nations urged not to vote against each other on Japanese whaling or calls for a South Atlantic whale sanctuary, means little was achieved at the meeting, environmentalists said.
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PUBLICATION: Montreal Gazette
DATE: 2008.06.28
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A21
DATELINE: SANTIAGO
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 141
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Anti-whale hunting nations led by Australia have voiced deep concern at Japan's skirting a non-binding 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling by killing hundreds of whales each year in the name of scientific research.
Japan says that it is unhappy with the moratorium and wants to resume commercial whaling, though detractors say it is already doing so in all but name.
The issue has generated so much tension that IWC chairperson Bill Hogarth, seeking to avoid confrontation, set up a working group to try to build consensus over the next year.
But that step, with nations urged not to vote against each other on Japanese whaling or calls for a South Atlantic whale sanctuary, means little was achieved at the meeting, environmentalists said.
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PUBLICATION: Montreal Gazette
DATE: 2008.06.28
EDITION: Final
SECTION: News
PAGE: A21
DATELINE: SANTIAGO
SOURCE: Reuters
WORD COUNT: 141
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