14 DAY TRIAL // Just days ago, on March 31, the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, ruled that Japan's yearly whale hunts in the Southern Ocean were a violation of a 1986 international moratorium on commercial whaling activities.
Hence, the International Court of Justice ordered the country to immediately stop issuing permits for whale hunts in the Antarctic. Much to the delight of conservationists, the country promised to abide by the United Nation's court ruling and kept its word.
Thus, the New York Times informs that, this past Wednesday, Japan went public with the news that it had canceled whaling activities in the Southern Ocean. Interestingly enough, the cancellation only applies to this year's planned whale hunt.
Besides, given the fact that the International Court of Justice only ruled against Japan's whaling program in the Antarctic, it is likely that the country's fleet will go on hunting marine mammals swimming in the North Pacific, simply because nobody has yet made this region off-limits as well.
In case anyone was wondering, Japan maintains that its hunts in the North Pacific are carried out for research purposes alone and have nothing to do with commercial whaling. As was the case with hunts in the Southern Ocean, conservationists are not buying these claims.
They say that, first off, Japanese whalers kill far too many marine mammals to be carrying out research operations alone. What's more, it often happens that the meat coming from these whales ends up on people's plates. Hence, the country must really be carrying out commercial whaling activities.
In a blogpost on the official website for the Sea Shepherd organization, Captain Paul Watson draws attention to two other troubling issues. He says that, despite the Japanese Foreign Ministry's promise that the country will no longer hunt whales in the Southern Ocean, the Japanese Fishing Ministry is yet to make such a commitment.
Therefore, it might happen that Japanese whalers will return to the Antarctic. “What is important is that if they do return they will return as outlaws in contempt and renegades against the ICJ [International Court of Justice] ruling,” the Sea Shepherd leader stresses.
Captain Paul Watson explains that, should this happen, Sea Shepherd members will be ready to once again engage Japanese whalers and make sure that they do not kill any marine mammals swimming in the Southern Ocean.
As the conservationist put it, “Our position is clear. The Japanese whalers cannot kill whales in an internationally established whale sanctuary and the Sea Shepherd ships and crews are the Guardians of the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.”