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Japanese whalers get reprieve as protest ship refuels
Sydney (AFP) Jan 3, 2009 A group of Australian environmental campaigners were on Saturday forced to withdraw from their high-seas pursuit of Japanese whalers to refuel, giving the harpooners a fortnight to hunt freely. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society vessel has been tailing the Japanese whaling fleet for the past two weeks, chasing them some 2,000 nautical miles (3,200 kilometres) through ice, rough seas and fog off Antarctica. Captain Paul Watson says the pursuit has prevented the Japanese from spearing any of the giant sea mammals, by keeping the fleet under pressure and driving them east. But Watson was forced to abort his campaign on Saturday, as dwindling fuel supplies drove the vessel, the "Steve Irwin", back to shore. "We have engaged them, we have stopped their whaling activities for two weeks and we have successfully chased them out of the Australian Antarctic Territorial waters," he said. "We now have to return to land to refuel. It will probably take us two weeks and then we'll be back again." Watson expressed frustration that the Japanese would have two weeks to hunt at will, but said his crew had no choice. "We don't have the luxury of refueling at sea like the Japanese fleet has. We don't have the resources to operate two ships down here and we don't have the support of Greenpeace to relieve us. "We are doing the best we can with the resources available to us and we are having a significant impact on their kills." Watson's group is in its fifth year of trailing whalers in the Southern Ocean, where Japan kills hundreds of the mammals a year in the name of scientific research, getting round an international commercial moratorium. Whale meat is a delicacy in Japan and Tokyo accuses critics of insensitivity to its whaling culture. Share This Article With Planet Earth
Related Links Follow the Whaling Debate
Activists attack Japanese whalers with stink bombs
Hong Kong (AFP) Dec 27, 2008Militant environmentalists said they had pelted stink bombs at a Japanese whaling ship in Australian waters in their latest bid to disrupt hunting of the protected creatures. |
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