Blair urged to block Japan’s whaling aims

Prime Minister Tony Blair has been urged by leading environmental groups to increase the UK’s pressure on Japan to abandon its commercial whaling aims at the upcoming International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting. A letter from the Whale Group of Wildlfie and Countryside Link, backed by some 8 million supporters, has been delivered to the PM to highlight the issue.

Japan has attempted to reintroduce commercial hunting at successive IWC meetings, through offering a series of incentives for developing nations to vote alongside them. NGOs have expressed concern that the ‘vote buying’ tactics could result in a pro-whaling majority at the next IWC event in June.

A moratorium has been in place for commercial whaling since 1986, while ‘scientific’ expeditions have been widely condemned.

"Last weekend Tony Blair witnessed the nation's innate passion for whales in the fate of heroic but ultimately tragic efforts to save one single stranded whale in the Thames. Yet thousands more whales could face an unnecessary death from harpoons if Japan and the other whaling nations get their way at this year's IWC,” said John Frizell, Chair of Link's Whale group. “This letter is to urge Tony Blair to heed the voice of our 8 million members and the nation by taking strong Government action to put a stop to the slaughter which is a disaster for whale conservation efforts."