David @ Tokyo

A small group of 12 largely anglo-saxon nations (UK, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, The Czech Republic, France, Germany, The Netherlands, New Zealand, and Spain) decided to criticise Norway.

Interesting to note:
1) The article notes that the timing of the criticism was planned to align with the beginning of the Norwegian hunting season. Why the delay? If you are asking the Norwegians not to kill whales, it makes far more sense to do it prior to the commencement of the season - not after it. The reason is that The move comes two weeks before British local elections in which the main parties are vying to demonstrate their environmental credentials.
Aha.

2) Despite the delay allowing plenty of time to gather signatures, only 12 nations were involved in the criticism. Of those, the Czech Republic doesn't have a coastline. Where is the "world opinion" against whaling? 12 nations is a piddling minority, and furthermore, down on a similar protest towards Japan earlier this year which garnered higher levels of support (17 nations).

UPDATE [4th June]:
A late addition to this story, but the IWMC noted in it's monthly Sustainable eNews newsletter that:

The United States opted against joining the demarche because the text of the letter contained factual errors.