Newsletter Nº2 - May 31st  2007
A historical resolution confirmed the Moratorium on Commercial Whaling

Anchorage, Alaska: Through an important whale protection voting, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) confirmed yesterday the commercial whaling prohibition. This was reverted last year by a declaration emitted from a temporary majority of pro-whaling nations in which was affirmed that “it [the moratorium] was no longer necessary”.

During the 2007 IWC annual meeting, a strengthening anti-whaling voting took place in Anchorage, Alaska, in which a resolution was approved by a simple majority. This resolution confirms that the commercial whaling prohibition “is still in place” and that is far from being lifted.

WDCS and Fundación Cethus willingly received this determination as an important sign for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), who defers to the commercial whaling prohibition established by the IWC.

The pro-whaling countries have tried in several occasions to resume the international trade of whale products, implementing strategies trying to show some weakness about the IWC in certain issues related to the whales populations management, especially to other organizations such as CITES.
The Resolution passed yesterday shows that this won’t be possible and, on the contrary, the IWC reinforces its position as well as its superiority in issues related to the management of whale populations.

Next week in the biennial meeting in the Netherlands, 171 members of CITES will consider Japan and Iceland proposals to obtain a resumption of the Whale Products International Trade. The resolution decided in the IWC yesterday, warns that any weakening in the protection of the trade “would have significantly adverse effects on the moratorium of the commercial whaling and would increase the threats for the whales”. And it concludes with a strong request towards the members of CITES of “not trying to transfer species of cetaceans from Appendix I of CITES while the moratorium is still in place”.

During the past 10 years, Japan and Norway have separately presented fourteen proposals to CITES to resume the international whale meat trade, which were fully rejected. This year, Japan and Iceland proposed CITES to lead a revision of all great whale status, in order to evaluate whether the level of protection CITES assigned to them was appropriate.

“Many Japan allies have denied-abstained to vote in the IWC, and have threatened CITES of generating troubles by saying that the resolution reflects only the view of a part of the members of the IWC. However, the fact demonstrates that a majority of governments who attended the meeting voted, and they did it in favor of this important resolution.”, said Sue Fisher from WDCS.

Although this new IWC meeting has already concluded with a positive balance in favor of the conservationists group, the repercussions will be seen during the next CITES meeting which will take place next June 3rd, in The Hague, Netherlands, where among other issues, whales and dolphins conservation proposals will be considered.

Sources:
www.iwcoffice.org
www.wdcs.org
Fundación Cethus www.cethus.org