Japan Resumes Commercial Whaling After 31 Years

Tokyo: Japanese whaling fleets set sail on Monday to hunt whales for commercial purposes for the first time in 31 years, a day after Tokyo formally withdrew from the International Whaling Commission (IWC). As an IWC member, Japan halted commercial whaling in 1988 but hunted whales for what it claims were research purposes, a practice criticized internationally as a cover for commercial whaling, reports Kyodo News Agency. On Monday morning, Nisshin Maru, a whale factory ship belonging to Kyodo Senpaku Co., and two other whalers left the port of Shimonoseki in the western Japan prefecture of Yamaguchi for offshore whaling of the minke, sei and Bryde’s whales. Five small vessels from six operators also left Kushiro in the island of Hokkaido to conduct coastal hunting of minke whales. (IANS)

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