David @ Tokyo

Two articles of interest:

1) Joji Morishita at Reuters on the IWC stalemate - plus an ultimatum of sorts. Readers outside Japan may like to note that it's an election year in Japan, thus talk of Japan leaving the IWC if it fails to fulfil it's mandate should be taken very seriously. Whether or not public support is growing for such a move is something that I think some polling should be done on. An editorial last year in the Nikkei following IWC 58 recommended (even further) patience.

My view? What is patience likely to result in? More waiting. Unless the IWC member numbers miraculously increase to 110, nothing fruitful is likely to come out of the IWC meetings, and scientific advice will continue to be ignored, no matter how much or little credibility it has. This is a bad situation, but can one let it stand like this forever?

2) The High North Alliance brings us news of the IUCN red list revisions pertaining to whales. Various down listings occurred, but the fin whale remains regarded by the IUCN as "endangered". We'll be looking out for further details of the reason for this - I imagine that the same criteria as with the previous assessment still applies.

Labels: IWC Normalization, Joji Morishita