Action against whalers in Europe and Southern Ocean

Sliced raw whale meat in a restaurant in Japan. Those in charge of the Norwegian stall could face a fine or even a prison sentence of up to five years. Photograph: Issei Kato/Reuters

The Guardian reports, 24th January 2014: “German customs officials have confiscated whale meat being sold as bite-sized snacks by a Norwegian stall at a trade fair celebrating trends in food, agriculture and gardening. The stall’s supervisor, Arne Andreas Rød, said he was surprised to hear the sale of whale meat was “meant to be illegal here”. He claimed his team had been able to take the food through customs without problem. “We wanted to showcase Norway’s variety,” he told the Berliner Zeitung newspaper. The meat is illegal in Germany and the majority of the EU.

Commercial whaling was banned by the International Whaling Commission’s moratorium in 1986, but both Iceland and Norway lodged objections to the ban in the 1990s. These days, Norway sets its own quota for how many animals its whalers are allowed to kill commercially each year. For 2013, the quota is set at 1,286 animals.

Meantime Sea Shepherd reports, 24th January 2014: “The Sea Shepherd Fleet has once again located the factory vessel of the Japanese whaling fleet, the Nisshin Maru, effectively suspending whale poaching operations in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.

Sea Shepherd Australia Managing Director, Jeff Hansen, welcomed the news: “Everything that is wrong with the world is represented in the massive floating slaughterhouse, the Nisshin Maru. When we shut down whaling in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, we send ripples around the world to support and encourage all those other brave environmental activists fighting for ensuring the integrity of humanity’s life support systems and upholding the laws of ecology. The Whale’s Navy is Relentless!”

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