GREENPEACE CONFRONTS JAPANESE WHALERS IN SOUTHERN OCEAN WHALE SANCTUARY
WASHINGTON- Following a 10-day search in Antarctic waters, the Greenpeace ship Esperanza today encountered Japan’s whaling fleet and immediately began taking peaceful direct action to stop the killing of whales in the Southern Ocean Whale.
The whaling fleet immediately took flight from the Esperanza, which is now in high-speed pursuit. While the fleet is on the run, the= whalers are unable to hunt. If the Japanese fleet tries to start whaling, the Esperanza’s international crew of activists will take peaceful action to prevent the Japanese government’s slaughter of
nearly 1,000 whales, including 50 endangered fin whales. The activists will use high-powered water pumps to create a curtain of water, obscuring the harpooners’ view and denying clear aim at the whales.
Greenpeace also radioed a statement to the whaling fleet in both English and Japanese. "Our vessel and crew are here in the Southern Ocean to condemn your hunt, which includes endangered species, and to insist that you leave the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary and return to port immediately,” said Sakyo Noda, Greenpeace Japan whales campaigner. „Your so-called scientific whaling is a hoax and has been dismissed as useless by the International Whaling Commission. Modern scientific research on whales does not require killing them."
When the whaling fleet left its home port of Shimonoseki in November, the government of Japan confirmed that the sole purpose of its so-called science program was to bring a return to commercial whaling. A June 2006 independent opinion poll by Nippon Research Center shows that a majority of the Japanese public does not support this hunt.
"The Japanese people do not support the whaling that is being carried out in their name and with their tax money,” said Junichi Sato, whales project leader for Greenpeace Japan. "It is time for Prime Minister Fukuda to put an end to Japan’s whaling scandal and to recall the fleet home to Japan."
This is Greenpeace’s ninth expedition to the Southern Ocean to defend the whales and the second in the last year. In February 2007, the Esperanza assisted and then escorted the whaling factory ship Nisshin Maru out of Antarctic waters, following a fire that left the factory ship disabled and one crewman dead.
