During a tumultuous second day at the 57th meeting of the International Whaling Commission in Ulsan, South Korea, member countries suffered through stalling tactics apparently aimed at securing support for a proposal to resume commercial whaling, and then promptly rejected Japan's attempt to expedite the end of the whaling ban.
Japan's proposal, a Revised Management Scheme with far weaker rules and regulations than the much-criticized multi-lateral RMS proposal member nations have been considering in recent months, would have required a three-quarters majority to succeed. It failed to achieve even a simple majority of votes. An RMS is a management tool for overseeing commercial whaling should the IWC ban on commercial whaling be overturned. The Japanese RMS proposal lacked any effective compliance mechanisms or monitoring requirements, and would have relied instead on the "honor system," something that failed miserably in the past to control whaling. If adopted, the proposal would have also lifted the moratorium, eliminated the whale sanctuaries currently recognized by the IWC, and removed IWC protection for several whale species.
Stalling for Votes
In the morning, meeting delegates scuffled over a request for a commissioners-only conference, which some believed to be a delay tactic to buy time for other pro-whaling country delegates to arrive in Korea and pay their dues so they could vote.
Before any business could be conducted at the morning session, the government of St. Lucia proposed a Commissioner's Meeting, a secret conference that non-government organizations are not permitted to observe. Australia called a vote to reject the meeting, but despite support from other pro-conservation countries the measure failed, and the meeting was held.
When the main meeting resumed, NGOs learned that nothing important had been discussed in the secret meeting, lending support to the idea that it was nothing more than a delay tactic. They also learned that a representative from Togo, a new pro-whaling member of the IWC, had just arrived in Korea and was making his way to the meeting—just in time for a vote on Japan's proposed RMS.
Nonetheless, in the afternoon session the proposal was rejected in a 29-23 vote.
"The RMS Japan proposed was woefully inadequate," said Kitty Block, director of Treaty Law, Oceans and Wildlife Protection for Humane Society International. "Thankfully, IWC members resisted pressure from Japan and its allies to accept such an unworkable, unreasonable, and unenforceable management scheme."
Speculation that Japan has used overseas aid to get countries to join the IWC and vote in favor of measures to resume commercial whaling has been widespread. Countries that have recently joined the IWC and voted with Japan tend to be small, poor, and in need of aid for their fisheries. Some countries historically sympathetic to commercial whaling, such as China and South Korea, abstained from voting on Japan's proposal.
"This vote exposed the countries whose only mandate at the IWC is to vote with Japan, along with Russia, Norway and Iceland," said HSI Australia Director Nicola Beynon.
Warning Bells
Pro-conservation countries have consistently warned that if the IWC is to even contemplate resuming the commercial hunting of animals as vulnerable as whales, members must, at the very least, ensure it is governed by rules and regulations that are "best practice" for modern fisheries. Today Japan told the meeting that they did not think that "best practice was necessary for whaling."
"That's an amazingly profligate thing to say," said Dr. Naomi Rose, marine mammal scientist for Humane Society International. "Anyone serious about 'sustainable hunting' would realize that best practice would be essential for mammals, who are comparatively long-lived and slower to reproduce than fish. Given the historical record on whaling, to say best practice isn't necessary is unbelievably irresponsible."
"Japan's admission that best practice is not necessary for whaling should sound warning bells to those countries that are contemplating compromising with Japan over whaling," Beynon added.
To observers, it seemed that Japan might finally have the majority needed to begin to dismantle the whaling ban this year.
But so far, the conservation countries have prevailed. According to Rose, however, "That majority is razor-thin."
