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Japan, ASEAN Agree on the Principle of Sustainable Whaling
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Japan and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) confirmed that they would reinforce coordination on fishery issues, including whaling.
The agreement came at the Seminar on Japan-ASEAN Cooperation To Promote Sustainable Fisheries through SEAFDEC held in Tokyo for three days from December 3, 2003. SEAFDEC, or Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center, is an autonomous intergovernmental body established as a regional treaty organization in 1967 to promote fisheries development in Southeast Asia.
The seminar was attended by over 70 highranking fisheries officials of Japan and ASEAN, including Fisheries Ministers from Malaysia and Indonesia.
Kyoichi Kawaguchi, then Deputy Director-General of the Fisheries Agency, told reporters: “It was a great achievement that we could gain understanding on the whaling issue after our efforts to convince them over the past years.
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Now the whaling issue has entered the framework of SEAFDEC. In the future, we would like to invite them to join the International Whaling Commission.
The two parties also confirmed the policy to counter the move to include the Whale Shark and Basking Shark in Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) as well as ongoing antifisheries campaign now being promoted in some western countries. In preparation for the forthcoming CITES Conference of Parties, to be held this year in Bangkok, Japan and ASEAN agreed to formulate a common position and policy toward the conference through meetings of CITES experts. |
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Two Japanese Sighting Boats Take Part in IWC’s Antarctic Research Program
Shonan-Maru and No. 2 Shonan-Maru participated in the International Whaling Commission’s SOWER program carried out from late December, 2003, to late February, 2004.
The program is aimed, among other things, to identify ways to manage minke whale resources in the region and to establish methods to distinguish the blue whale from the pygmy blue whale.
The area covered in the survey was south of 60 degrees S to the ice edge, from 170 degrees E to 170 degrees W, and the Ross Sea. Eight researchers from New Zealand, the United States, Japan and Chile were onboard the survey vessels.
A Japanese source close to the research program said that the survey might contribute to verifying the hypothesis that the increasing minke whales are hampering the recovery of the blue whale resources.
Shonan-Maru and No. 2 Shonan-Maru were provided by the Japanese Government as SOWER research vessels. |
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Correct Understanding of Whaling Culture Called for at Tokyo Symposium
An international symposium to discuss mutual understanding on the utilization and conservation of marine living resources, with a special emphasis on whaling, was held in Tokyo on February 25, 2004.
The symposium was featured by keynote speeches of four speakers on the following subjects: “Ethics of WhalingEby Professor Yoshihiro Hayashi of Tokyo University; “the Religious Roots of Environmentalism in the WestEby Professor Robert Nelson of the University of Maryland; “Cultural Changes and Tradition in the Modernizing Process of Whaling on the Japanese IslandsEby Professor Katsuaki Morita of Konan Women’s University; and “Understanding Japanese Whaling: A Foreign Journalist’s PerspectiveEby Mr. Jeremy Bristow, producer at the British Broadcasting Corporation.
The symposium, jointly organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other organizations, was attended by about 120 people from the government, academic circles, mass media and fisheries and other industries. |
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