"Commercial whaling has no place in the 21st century"

Japanese Antarctic Whaling CampaignHelp stop the illegal Japanese whaling program in the southern ocean

   

By the time the world realized that whales were not just oversize fish but warm-blooded, sentient mammals with large brains, sophisticated social structures and an elaborate language, it was nearly too late. An orgy of unrestrained whale hunting had already sent many species to the brink of extinction. Environmental groups lobbied hard to stop the whale killing and in 1986 they came close; the International Whaling Commission (IWC) voted to prohibit whaling with a global moratorium. However Japan, Iceland, Norway and Denmark have slaughtered tens of thousands of whales in the past 20 years since the moratorium came in place. Japan and Iceland have killed whales in the name of science, although the meat they take ends up on dinner tables, and they have now opened illegal trade routes of endangered species against International Law. Norway doesn't even bother pretending and they have now been joined by Iceland in openly flouting the IWC's rules with unrestricted quotas, including the hunting of endangered species.