Suffering of Whales Prompts Global Anti-Whaling Campaign

LONDON, UK, March 9, 2004 (ENS) - Whaling is too cruel to continue, a global coalition of 140 nongovernmental organizations in 55 countries said today at the launch of an international campaign to halt the practice everywhere in the world.

Led by the World Society for the Protection of Animals, the coalition is lobbying the International Whaling Commission (IWC) to maintain the current ban on commercial whaling and focus on the issue of cruelty at the 2004 meeting of the IWC scheduled for July in Sorrento, Italy.

Peter Davies, director general of the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) said, "The cruelty behind whaling has become obscured in recent years by abstract arguments over population statistics. The fact is that, whether it is one whale or a thousand, whaling is simply wrong on cruelty grounds alone."

Although an IWC moratorium on commercial whaling has been in place since 1986, more than 20,000 whales have been killed since the ban took effect, the coalition says.

Japanese kill a minke whale in the Southern Ocean (Photo courtesy Greenpeace)

A new report, "Troubled Waters," co-authored by the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, is being released today by the Whalewatch coalition to document the cruelty that takes place on the high seas during whaling operations. In his foreword to the report, naturalist and broadcaster Sir David Attenborough says the report contains "hard scientific dispassionate evidence that there is no humane way to kill a whale at sea."

"Whales are highly evolved animals with all the sensitivities that that statement implies. They have a complex social life. They call to one another across the vast expanses of the oceans," wrote Attenborough. "They are the largest animals that have ever existed, far larger than any dinosaur. There is nothing in the body of a whale, which is of use to us, for which we cannot find equivalents elsewhere."

The technology used for killing whales today is the same as it was in the 19th century, when the grenade tipped harpoon was invented, the report explains. The harpoon is intended to penetrate the whale's body before detonating, killing it by inflicting massive shock or injury.

The graphic description of Dr. Harry Lillie, who worked as a ship’s physician on a whaling trip in the Antarctic in the 1940s, is quoted. He wrote, “If we can imagine a horse having two or three explosive spears stuck in its stomach and being made to pull a butcher’s truck through the streets of London while it pours blood into the gutter, we shall have an idea of the method of killing. The gunners themselves admit that if whales could scream, the industry would stop for nobody would be able to stand it.”

In 1975 Dr. Lillie presented written testimony to the U.S. Congress in which he comments on another whaling expedition, the one that made him devote his life to compassionate activities.

"In 1946-47 it was as surgeon with a whaling fleet in the Atlantic that I saw it take up to an hour to tear and blast the lives out of the magnificent whales; surely the finest creature this world will ever know. As explosive harpoons were fired to burst in their intestines, I realized that at least half my life would have to be concerned with our fellow creatures and the rest with humans."

A harpoon gunner takes aim. (Photo courtesy Australian Conservation Foundation)

Given the constantly moving environment in which whales live and are hunted, there are inherent difficulties in achieving a quick clean kill, the coalition points out. The harpoon often fails to kill its victim right away and some whales take over an hour to die.

Norway reported that one in five whales failed to die instantaneously during its 2002 hunt, while Japan reported that the majority of whales, almost 60 percent failed to die instantaneously in its 2002-3 hunt.

Current tests to determine the moment of death in a whale are inadequate. The question remains whether whales may in fact still be alive long after having been judged to be dead. The full extent of their suffering is yet to be scientifically evaluated.

The IWC criteria for determining the time to death in hunted cetaceans are - relaxation of the lower jaw, or no flipper movement, or sinking without active movement.

For the coalition's report these criteria were reviewed by a group of scientists and veterinarians with expertise in welfare, physiology, and anatomy, who concluded that they were not adequate to determine precisely the point of death.

"Cetaceans are adapted for diving, and consequently have developed mechanisms for storing oxygen in their tissues. Thus they may survive, but have the potential to experience pain over a longer period than indicated by the current IWC criteria," the report states.

The failure to land whales that are struck and injured by whaling operations is "a severe welfare problem," the coalition believes. Struck and lost cetaceans may live on after their injuries, which may lead to infection, restricted mobility, and shattered joints or central nervous system damage. They may suffer an inability to feed, socialize or reproduce.

A whaler raises his rifle to kill a wounded whale. (Photo courtesy SRCE)

The methods used for killing highly evolved cetaceans are not even as humane as the methods used for killing livestock, the authors make clear.

Basic principles that must be addressed to protect the welfare of animals at slaughter have been identified for livestock animals, the report states, are, "pre-slaughter handling facilities which minimize stress; use of competent well-trained, caring personnel; appropriate equipment, which is fit for the purpose; an effective process which induces immediate unconsciousness and insensibility, or an induction to a period of unconsciousness without distress; and, guarantee of non-recovery from that process until death ensues."

None of these criteria are observed during a whale hunt.

Whaling nations have sometimes claimed that they are treated unfairly because people appear to value whales more highly than other animals such as farm animals. But this "value debate is not fundamental to the requirement of whales to be treated humanely," the report says, since their slaughter does not meet the basic standards required for slaughter of livestock killed for food.

The coalition objects to the lack of regulation to protect the welfare of whales within the IWC. "There are no regulations designed to ‘avoid excitement, pain or suffering’, no maximum pursuit times, no limit on the number of weapons or bullets that can be used on one animal, no upper limit on the acceptable time to death, no specific requirement for the rate of instantaneous kills, and, in many hunts, there is no limit on the number of animals that can be struck and lost."

Scientific or research permit proposals are not subject to an independent ethical review process.

For all these reasons, the coalition says modern whaling arouses "serious animal welfare concerns." A number of factors inherent in current whaling practices render it unlikely that truly humane standards could ever be achieved. On grounds of animal welfare alone, therefore, all whaling operations should be halted.

The campaign to stop whaling is being launched to oppose a campaign of the Japanese to bring other nations to their point of view that "sustainable use" of whales is necessary and justified.

One of their lobbying efforts took place at a Tokyo hotel last October 1. Members of the Sustainable Use Parliamentarians Union of Japan (SUPU-Japan), exchanged views on sustainable use of natural resources with delegates from African countries at a welcome reception for the Tokyo International Conference on Africa's Development, the Japan Whaling Association newsletter of December 2003 reports.

SUPU-Japan Chairman Yutaka Takeyama greets Thiam Ousman Tolo of Guinea. (Photo courtesy Japan Whaling Association)

He called on African delegates to join SUPU, stressing the need for parliamentarians throughout the world to unite to promote the concept of sustainable use of the resources.

On behalf of the African delegates present at the reception, Ambassador Thiam Ousman Tolo of Guinea expressed support of SUPU’s concept, saying “developing countries use marine resources extensively, and protecting those resources without scientific evidence may threaten our wildlife resources.”

Japanese officials have repeatedly reminded the world of the importance of marine living resources to world food security and the need for whales to be seen as a marine living resource whose management should be based on science and not emotion.