David @ Tokyo

Hi David,

This year's IWC meeting has been going backward, despite Japan's efforts to find a consensus.

I've found a funny article on GP Japan's Jun.ichi Sato's blog. He says that the Japanese media is not relating the reality of the IWC. Coming from a member of GP, that's quite ironic, isn't it?

Read it if you're not too tired.
http://www.greenpeace.or.jp/campaign/oceans/whale/sato/

Unfortunately, it is not possible to comment on his blog... I wonder why.
 

I have little time for Greenpeace these days, but I did read some of Sato's blog earlier during the IWC.

It was amusing reading him complain about how the Japanese media weren't coming to him to get any comment.

I wondered why he believed they should? Greenpeace are just a bunch of show ponies, and this is evident to the Japanese more than anyone.

Sato gave me another laugh later on in the IWC - some western media articles quoted him complaining that true conservation threats to whales had not been discussed much at the IWC, due to the arguments over "commercial whaling".

It seemed to be lost on him that his organization, which annually spends millions campaigning to "stop commercial whaling", was even partly responsible for this state of affairs.

And indeed, shortly after the IWC meeting and relevant section of CITES had concluded, Greenpeace noted that their "whale blog is coming to a hiatus - not a permanent end, just a hiatus."

No doubt the "hiatus" will come to an end as soon as the JARPA fleet leaves port, and there will be hardly any focus on anything other than Japanese whaling, as usual...

Greenpeace make me sick :-)