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Source: Reuters
An international legal challenge to Japan's yearly whale hunt
near Antarctica is being seriously considered by Australia, with
the controversial cull set to begin in weeks, Prime Minister Kevin
Rudd said.
Japan's new centre-left government has promised to continue its
annual scientific research whaling program and said there was no
intention to review the policy, which has attracted widespread
diplomatic and environmental condemnation.
"We don't accept Japan's premise of so-called scientific whaling,"
Rudd told local radio in Melbourne.
"We, if we cannot resolve this matter diplomatically, will take
international legal action. I'm serious about it, I would prefer to
deal with it diplomatically, but if we cannot get there, that's the
alternative course of action," Rudd said.
Rudd's centre-left government has been accused of backpeddling on
previous threats of an International Court of Justice challenge to
avoid damaging Australia's Japan trade relationship and glacial
negotiations on a free trade pact.
A court challenge would lead to so-called provisional orders for
Japan to immediately halt whaling ahead of a full hearing.
"A country like Japan is quite law-abiding. I doubt very much
whether a country like Japan would risk ignoring a binding ruling
by a leading international court," Australian international law
expert Don Rothwell said.
Some legal experts believe the Japanese cull is in breach of
several international laws and treaties, including the Antarctic
Treaty System and the Convention on International Trade in
Endangered Species.
Japan's whaling fleet has left harbour and is en route to the
Southern Ocean to harpoon up to 935 minke whales and 50 fin whales,
classified as endangered.
Anti-whaling activists have promised to disrupt the hunt.
The hard-line Sea Shepherd group was to leave an Australian port
on Friday, joined by a New Zealand world record-holding powerboat,
adding more speed to disruption efforts.
"We do not condone, indeed we condemn, dangerous or violent
activities, by any of the parties involved, be it demonstrators or
whalers," Foreign Minister Murray McCully and his Australian
counterpart Stephen Smith said in a statement.
Commercial whaling was banned under a 1986 treaty.
But the Japanese have continued to cull whales for research and
to monitor their impact on fish stocks, deflecting criticism from
anti-whaling nations like Australia, Britain and New Zealand.
Japan was Australia's top export destination in 2008, with two-way
trade worth $79 billion.
Canberra also maintained a $34 billion trade surplus on the back
of coal and iron ore exports.
Australia and Japan also signed in 2007 a security pact
strengthening military co-operation, striking Japan's first defence
agreement with a country other than the United States.
Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama came to power in August promising a
shift in Japan's domestic and international policies, but Foreign
Minister Katsuya Okada said that did not include the annual whale
cull.
"We have a tradition here in Japan of eating whale meat," Okada
told Australian radio.
"We do not think there is a need for a policy review at this
point in time. I think we should try to discuss it without emotion
and in a very calm way."
Australia has previously sent a customs ship to Antarctica to
gather evidence for an international court challenge.
"We've tried to work our way through this diplomatically with the
Japanese government. That's run into some obvious obstacles," Rudd
said.
Japan maintains whaling is a cultural tradition and while most
Japanese do not eat whale meat on a regular basis, many are
indifferent to accusations that hunting the creatures is cruel.
