Norway extends whaling season, quotas unfilled (fwd)

NORWAY EXTENDS WHALING SEASON, QUOTAS UNFILLED

Oslo, Aug 1 Reuters - Norway has extended its controversial whaling season for a month to the end of August after hunters failed to harpoon permitted quotas, the Fisheries Ministry said on Tuesday.

''We have prolonged the season,'' Johan Williams, head of the ministry's resource management division, told Reuters. Whalers had caught about 470 minke whales of a quota of 655 originally meant to be caught by the end of July.

Williams said some whalers had started the summer season late and that seas had been rough, especially off south Norway. Big waves and overcast skies mean hunters are unable to spot the steel-grey minke whales when they briefly surface for air.

Norway, a major whaling nation like Japan, which is under US pressure to call off an expanded hunt in the north Pacific, resumed commercial hunts in 1993 in defiance of a moratorium by the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

Earlier on Tuesday, Japan defended itself for pressing ahead with a whale hunt in the northwestern Pacific despite US threats of sanctions.

A Japanese fleet set out at the weekend to hunt whales including sperm and Bryde's whales, two species protected under US law.

Oslo says stocks of minke whales, which grow up to about 10 metres long, are relatively abundant in the north Atlantic. The red meat is a delicacy and eaten as steaks.

Norway's NTB news agency said whalers had caught just 70 of a quota of 244 of the mammals in the North Sea. In more northerly waters, 348 of a quota of 411 whales had been caught.

Williams said whalers would be allowed to hunt in certain areas in August but only if they had ministry observers aboard their vessels to monitor the hunt in which harpoons tipped with grenades are used. Whalers would not be allowed to exceed the existing budget for observers.

He dismissed suggestions that a failure to reach the quotas could indicate stocks were smaller than Norway estimated. ''Conditions in the North Sea are often difficult,'' he said, adding that shallow water in many areas exaggerated waves.

Anti-whaling countries blocked a drive by Norway and Japan to win official acceptance of their hunts at an annual meeting in Australia last month.

Norway cut the 2000 quota from 753 whales in 1999, when whalers ended up catching just 583.

It failed to inform its readers with a core point.

They catch whales with a view of sustainable use, which is agreed on a international treaty, called International Convention For The Regulation Of Whaling. USA has also signed this treaty.

International Convention For The Regulation Of Whaling http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/iwcoffice/ Convention.htm

Under the treaty, their activities are totally legal. While USA's sanction is under suspicion of violating the international agreement.

Both of species are not endangered. Why USA has to threaten a foreign country with sanction to blockade a sustainable use?

Harsh seas become even more dangerous when they face activists, illegally obstructing them.

In the eyes of the law, anti-whaling countries action is under suspicion of violating the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties.

1. Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) is an international law which sets requirements of international conventions and treaties. 2. International Convention For The Regulation Of Whaling (ICRW), which

all nations in IWC has ratified, is a International convention to regulate whaling with a view of sustainable use. 3. In IWC, anti-whaling countries is blockading the resume of whaling ,

even though credible scientific opinion supports the sustainable use of abundant whale resources.

In short, anti-whaling countries are violating VCLT by ignoring a international treaty (ICRW) which they also has ratified.

Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (If you dare to see .....) http://www.unog.ch/archives/vienna/vien_69.htm

All countries are required to respect the international treaty they has ratified and work together on sustainable use of resources. Somehow, some want whales to be an exception for various mysterious reasons though.

Takayuki Kono