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Originally published on June 29, 2012
By Daniel McGlynn
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Overview
For two weeks, the Bob Barker, a converted whaling ship manned by anti-whaling activists, pursued the Japanese whaler Nisshin Maru and two smaller harpoon vessels. Finally, on March 5, the activists from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society caught up to the whalers in the icy waters of the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, 60 miles off the Antarctic coast.[1]
The Nisshin Maru has been hunting whales in the region since 1986, claiming that the kills are for scientific research — and thus exempt from a ban on whaling in the sanctuary imposed by the International Whaling Commission.[2] But anti-whaling activists, along with some mainstream scientists, say the claims of research are a farce.[3] The whale meat harvested in the sanctuary, they charge, ends up in Japanese shops and restaurants.
When they shipped out last December, the Japanese planned to kill 900 whales, a limit they created for themselves through a loophole in IWC rules.[4] But their mission plans changed after the confrontation with the Bob Barker.
As darkness fell and snow pelted the ships, the two sides beamed blinding lights and piercing lasers at each other, tried to foul each other's propellers with heavy ropes and darted perilously close to each other's bows . . .
Document Citation
McGlynn, D. (2012, June 29). Whale hunting. CQ Researcher, 22, 573-596. http://library.cqpress.com/
Document ID: cqresrre2012062900
Document URL: http://library.cqpress.com/cqpac/cqresrre2012062900