IT IS the long unwritten law of the sea that we must help a person in distress on the water. That is what the people of Tasmania, as Australians, have done this week. We have opened our city and extended our care to a sick Japanese citizen because it is the right thing to do. Without our willing help, he could die.
But we stand up here in this historic whaling port of Hobart — a place which has moved with more enlightened times — on behalf of every Australian who also respects the sanctity of the whales’ life. We protest absolutely the presence in Australian territorial waters and off Tasmania yesterday of the whaling ship, Keiko Maru.
If the vessel had not requested a rescue helicopter from an obliging Howard Government and thus avoided the port, we would have extended an appropriate welcome — peaceful but passionate — to the Keiko Maru and its crew. We would have given them a message to take back to Japan with their terrible catch.
That message is so straightforward. It is shared by Australians across the generations and of all voting creeds. It doesn’t matter if you live in Alice Springs, Hervey Bay or Hobart. Those spectacular whales are dear to contemporary Australia’s heart.
We love them for what they are, and with one voice we say to the Japanese and the Norwegians, bung up your bloody harpoons. It’s the 21st century, and we have to evolve, recognise we are all part of the web of life. Enough harm has been done.
This death ship operates officially unhindered
Australia was not obliged to help the Keiko Maru resume its activities in the killing fields of Antarctica, inside our territorial waters. If the ship had entered our port, we should have refused to refuel it. We should have taken Japan’s unlawful ‘scientific’ program on, here in Hobart and prevented the Keiko Maru’s return voyage. The ship has but one purpose; to kill and process whales for the Japanese table in contravention of international agreements.
This death ship operates officially unhindered with the Japanese whaling fleet in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary. This year Japan is doubling its take to 950 Minke Whales, and — for the first time — the Fin and the mighty Humpback… that creature which leaves us in open, collective wonderment on its annual migration along Australia’s east coast.
No one but the Japanese proponents pretends it’s science. The Keiko Maru is part of a grotesque and senseless trade in the edible flesh of a fellow sentient being — one that is on the endangered list as a threatened species, and since 1986 protected by international law.
Those brave Rainbow Warriors, the crews of two Greenpeace ships down there in the churning Southern Ocean, between the harpoons and their unknowing targets. We owe them our gratitude.
Smallest of the seven great whales, the Minke is highly intelligent and socially complex. Sadly, in the context of commercial whaling, it is also inquisitive and is known to move towards maritime activity. Greenpeace reports up to twelve whales killed on Wednesday, four yesterday.
Again we are indebted to Greenpeace
The whales now have a brief reprieve from the hunt. Again, we are indebted to Greenpeace. But their ships will leave at the end of January and the whaling continues until March. Every day in the south and north polar seas, more will die for the Japanese whale eating public. It’s an international disgrace.
Environment Minister Ian Campbell describes the pictures we have seen —
“Many of them are drowning in their own blood and in Southern Ocean sea water, being dragged aboard these vessels and having their flesh stripped off them. It is nothing other than slaughter. It’s an insult to science. It needs to stop. The world said it should stop.”
Yes, it has and it should. It must. So Senator Campbell, what are we to do about recalcitrant whaling nations? Have we explored all the options?
Australia was central to the creation of the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, yet we seem to have no capacity to defend it should diplomacy fail, as it has. It is left up to Greenpeace to give voice to our disgust and track the whaling ships over weeks in the ocean, to intercept and disrupt this demonstrably unlawful harvest.
Gutsy as this effort is, it is not enough to save threatened marine giants which the international community and law have committed to protecting. The Australian government is being urged to take Japan to an International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea. Yet this path requires a willingness to confront and shame an important trading partner. To date, Senator Campbell has rejected this legal option —
At the very least initially, at an official level, we need to know exactly what’s going on down there in our territorial waters. Senator Bob Brown is calling on the Howard Government to send surveillance ships south to record the carnage. Given our strong language on whaling at the IWC, it is not unreasonable to suggest Australia could do more to confirm our determination and sincerity.
It would be a small victory if he went back to Japan a different man
Almost 1000 whales to be slaughtered, each year from now into the foreseeable future. Japan has already been flouting the moratorium on whaling for eighteen years. How long can it go on before the great whale family is gutted, once again, by murderous industry?
I hope the young seaman from the Keiko Maru enjoys a successful and relaxing recovery in the care of staff at the Royal Hobart Hospital. Perhaps, if he is somehow made aware of the stir his arrival has caused, the patient will have cause to reflect on his chosen trade.
It would be a small victory if he went back to Japan a different man, with a deepened respect for life in all its forms.
We live in hope. Change can sometimes be maddeningly incremental, but to cherry-pick from Churchill; we must never, never, never give up on those marvelous creatures in our collective care.
We have to fight for their survival every drawn-out step of the way.
Cassy O’Connor is a Greens candidate for Denison in the upcoming state election.
www.cassyoconnor.com
