JAPAN'S DREADFUL WHALING HISTORY

Hi,

For those of you who are not aware of the history of Japan's murder of the whale nations, here's some of the story, with thanks to Craig Van Note of the Washington DC Monitor Consortium who has written extensively on this issue.

In the 1930's, the Japanese Imperial Army directed the whaling massacre. During those years, several international agreements designed to prevent the over-exploitation of stocks of whales

were reached under the League of Nations ( forerunner of the United Nations.) The agreements prohibited against killing suckling calves and females with calves. Japan refused to sign or abide by any of these agreements.

After World War II, the Japanese government gave its whalers carte blanche. From l951-l964, the Japanese IWC Commissioner, acting on the orders of Japan's giant whaling companies, blocked all attempts at the IWC to halt the killing of blue and humpback whales.

Japan only agreed to the IWC ban on hunting blue whales after its seven fleets, deploying more than 100 catcher boats , could not find a single blue whale in 1964. But they did find remnant herds sheltering in the coastal fjords of southern Chile. In four years, Japanese whalers killed 690 blue whales, often pursuing mothers and calves into the deepest reaches of the fjords, where the still waters were stained with their blood.

There is much more of this dreadful history of murder. Japanese whalers continue to this day to ignore international conventions, 33 resolutions at the IWC calling for a halt of the obscenely entitled " Japanese scientific whaling " program; and their whalers continue to kill pregnant whales, and females with young calves.

And the response of the anti whaling nations ???? They want to overturn the global moratorium on commercial whaling and give Japan the go-ahead to return to commercial whaling.

We are betrayed by our leaders, and the whale nations, who cannot speak, are condemned to death.

Please protest to your own governments. Deluge the White House, deluge your Prime Minister's office. Do not believe the Australian government with their false promises. The anti whaling nations are tied to Japan with the trade obligations. Money versus whales.

The fact that whales, like the majestic Gray Whale, still come to humans is a miracle. We owe their nations their survival.

Sue Arnold, California Gray Whale Coalition.