Source:
Associated PressSYDNEY, Nov. 19 (Kyodo) - New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark has lashed out at Japan's whaling program, saying Monday its whaling fleet should have stayed home rather than operate under the "deceptive" guise of a scientific operation.
Japan's annual whaling season has just begun, with a fleet of four vessels, including the mother ship Nisshin Maru, leaving Shimonoseki on Sunday for the Southern Ocean.
Media coverage of the departure has been widespread in New Zealand and Australia, both staunch anti-whaling nations, and has sparked renewed protests against the hunt.
Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said Monday his government was "deeply disappointed" by the departure and had instructed its ambassador in Tokyo to lodge an official complaint.
Scientific whaling a deception: NZ November 19, 2007
NEW Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark says Japan's whaling fleet is heading for the Southern Ocean under the "deception" of a scientific expedition.
The fleet left for Antarctic waters yesterday, led by the 8000-tonne
Nisshin Maru, trailed by environmentalists for a hunt that will include humpback whales for the first time since a 1963 moratorium put the giant marine mammals under international protection.
Clark said today she hoped there would not be a repeat of the “very unfortunate incidents” which occurred last season when protesters clashed with the fleet.
She also referred to the fire that crippled the
Nisshin Maru and killed a crew member last year.
“Last year there was loss of life down there, it's very difficult for us, as the nearest country with any sort of search and rescue capacity, to offer any help,” she said on TV One's Breakfast program. “It would just be better if the Japanese stayed home and didn't come down under the guise, the deception, the claim that it is scientific whaling when they want to take a thousand whales.”
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http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22781966-601,00.html Read more:
http://article.wn.com/view/2007/11/19/Japanese_whalers_unwelcome_NZ_premier_says_6
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