Today the Senate passed a motion calling for the Australian Government to act over Japan’s intransigence in flouting international law to undertake commercial whaling in the Southern Ocean.

Greens spokesperson for Whaling, Senator Whish-Wilson said, “Australia needs to send the strongest possible message to Japan that the illegal whaling and flouting of international law has to stop. If the Australian government won’t do this, then the Parliament must force their hand.

“All Australians of all political persuasions want to see whales protected. This is an issue that historically has cut across the political divide.

“The Government has to send a patrol boat to the Southern Ocean forthwith, it needs to raise whaling with Japan immediately and publically, and it needs to start actively considering new legal strategies,” he concluded.

MOTION

That the Senate notes:
(a) in 1979 Australia adopted an anti-whaling policy, permanently ending whaling in Australian waters;
(b) in 1986 the International Whaling Commission moratorium on commercial whaling came into place;
(c) in March, 2014 Australia won its case against Japan in the International Court of Justice in regards to whaling in Antarctic waters;
(d) in November, 2014 Japan lodged a new whaling plan with the International Whaling Commission to slaughter 3,333 minke whales in Antarctic water;
(e) in April, 2015 the Scientific Committee rejected the need for lethal whale sampling in order for Japan to achieve its scientific objectives;
(f) on 19 of November of 2015 the Australia Federal Court fined the Japanese whaling company Kyodo $1 million for hunting whales within an Australian whale sanctuary; and
(g) This week the Japanese Government gave notice that the whaling fleet will be leaving port to carry out their commercial whaling this week.

And the Senate calls upon the Government and the Prime Minister to:
(a) uphold their election commitment and send a customs patrol vessel to monitor any Japanese whaling activity and collect evidence for future legal actions;
(b) raise the issue and express the disappointment of the Australian people directly with the Japanese Prime Minister during discussions on bilateral relations; and
(c) consider the option put forward by the Second Sydney Panel of Independent Experts to pursue United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea dispute resolution mechanisms to hold Japan accountable for their continued commercial whaling.
Greens spokesperson for Whaling, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson