IFAW statement Patrick Ramage, Director of IFAW's Global Whale Campaign, said: "Under a cloud of corruption allegations the IWC is taking a safe course, opting for a cooling off period that protects the moratorium and other IWC conservation measures. Had it been done here, this deal would have lived in infamy."
The failed proposal, three years in the making, had included a compromise between whaling and non-whaling nations which regularly clash at annual IWC meetings. Among its most hotly debated components was a plan to overturn the worldwide ban on whaling, in place since 1986, by allowing legalized hunting of whales by Iceland, Norway and Japan - the last three countries still hunting whales commercially. Japan, Norway and Iceland have illegally killed nearly 35,000 whales since the inception of the moratorium.
"This was an intense three-year effort but one conducted behind closed doors and focused on defining terms under which commercial whaling would continue rather than how it would end," said Ramage. "The proposal it produced could not withstand public scrutiny and ignored the overwhelming global support for permanent protection for whales. Any future process of negotiation should not leave the views, expertise and perspective of the global NGO community sitting outside."
Robbie Marsland, UK Director of IFAW, added: "IFAW opposes whaling because it is cruel and unnecessary. Now that this deal has failed we look forward to seeing the IWC return to the conservation of whales. We all still need to keep working to preserve the ban on commercial whaling and protect whales for the future." | Progress of IWC 62 is a disappointment: WWFWWF is extremely disappointed at the breakdown in negotiations among governments at the 62nd annual International Whaling Commission. The 88 governments attending the meeting considered a new proposal put forward by the Chair that would have allowed commercial whaling in the Southern Ocean for the first time in almost 25 years and would have set commercial whaling quotas for whales listed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as endangered. But delegates said today they had reached an ‘impasse' on the proposal, so it is highly unlikely that a decision on the future of the IWC will be made this week. More than 33,000 whales have been killed since the ban on commercial whaling was put in place. "WWF is extremely disappointed with the progress of this meeting," said Wendy Elliott, WWF International Species Manager.
"A compromise solution which brings whaling under the control of the IWC is clearly needed, and governments at this meeting failed to find a way forward. Once again, they have put politics before science. "This brings into question the integrity of the Commission and its ability to make meaningful decisions that benefit whale conservation." "WWF has always fully supported the maintenance of the 1982 moratorium on commercial whaling at the IWC." "The huge amount of political will and good relations that have been developed through this process must not be set aside at this critical juncture for whales." "The IWC can only move forward by focusing on saving whales, not on politics." Wendy Elliott added. |
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