IWC panel proposes allowing coastal whaling

LONDON, Feb. 3 Kyodo -
An International Whaling Commission panel proposed Monday allowing Japan to
hunt whales in its own coastal waters if the country drastically scales down
its so-called ''research whaling'' program in the Antarctic Ocean.
Conservation groups are critical of the proposal, with the World Wildlife Fund
saying on its website that it gives ''too much to the whalers and not enough to
whale conservation.''
The proposal will be discussed at the IWC's general meeting in Portugal in June.
At a press conference Tuesday in Tokyo, Japanese Agriculture, Forestry and
Fisheries Minister Shigeru Ishiba suggested Japan will reject a proposal that
would halt its research whaling.
According to the panel report, the coastal whaling would be approved at four
points in Hokkaido, Miyagi, Chiba and Wakayama prefectures for five years with
a single-day hunt of minke whales by less than five vessels.
Japan halted commercial whaling in 1986 in line with an international
moratorium, but has been hunting whales since 1987 for what it calls scientific
research purposes. Environmentalists condemn such whale hunting as a cover for
commercial whaling.
==Kyodo
2009-02-03 22:15:24