Government voice joins whaling protest

As Greenpeace campaigners prepared for another day of confrontation with a Japanese whaling fleet in the Southern Ocean, the New Zealand Government released a damning report on Japan's whaling programme, saying it lacked scientific credibility.

Conservation Minister Chris Carter said that under the programme known as Jarpa II in the Southern Ocean, Japan was going to more than double the number of whales it killed.

"Those whales will be killed inside the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary and well outside Japan's own territorial waters," he said yesterday.

"For any nation to contemplate this kind of programme, it should at the very least have a robust scientific justification. Japan does not."

On Wednesday, two Greenpeace boats tracked down the Nisshin Maru whaling vessel off the Antarctic coast and watched a whale being harpooned.

They then tried to stop the boat loading the dead whale.

One of the smaller Japanese capture boats later rammed one of the Greenpeace ships to try to push it clear of the whale loading process.

Greenpeace New Zealand whales campaigner Pia Mancia said Greenpeace vessels had remained near the whalers through the short Antarctic night, and there had been no whaling activity since Wednesday afternoon.

The Government report, prepared by scientists Simon Childerhouse, Mike Donoghue and Scott Baker, says Jarpa II contains numerous flaws and is based on speculative and unsound science.

The key findings in the report are:

* Most of the data proposed to be collected in Japan's programme is not required for the management of conservation of whale stocks.

* Many objectives are based on unsubstantiated or incorrect assumptions.

* Many objectives can be addressed through analysing data from Japan's previous 18-year programme.

* The few objectives that do have some relevance to the management and conservation can be addressed better using non-lethal methods.

* Serious concerns are held about the impact of the proposed kills on protected stocks, for which there are no agreed abundance estimates.

* The proposed kills are being undertaken in the International Whaling Commission-approved Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.

The Fisheries Agency of Japan announced this year that it intended to double its take to 1000, including the threatened fin whales - the second largest whales in the world.

The agency says its operation is scientific, which means it can exploit an IWC loophole, but the meat from the whales will end up on the shelves of Japanese markets as a luxury item.

- NZPA