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(Santiago,
Chile) - As the 60th meeting of the International Whaling Commission
continues its deliberations, the Bush administration is undermining decades of
whale conservation progress as it seeks to cut a deal with whaling nations that
could lead to the official resumption of commercial whaling. Their deal making
will be done behind closed doors without public oversight or accountability as
the Bush administration has abandoned American principles of openness and
honesty in order to engage in secret deliberations.
“It’s no secret that President Bush
has one of the worst environmental record of any administration in
history, but to sacrifice whales and democracy to placate whaling
countries who have ignored repeated calls by many of the world’s
governments to end whaling, is beyond the pale,” states D.J.
Schubert, a wildlife biologist with the Animal Welfare Institute.
“If this administration is willing to sacrifice whales to achieve a
political end, there’s no telling what damage it could do to
wildlife as President Bush’s eight-year reign of terror ends.”
Already this
week, the Bush administration has:
- Ignored IWC
rules for reporting transgressions of the IWC Schedule by refusing to admit that
the illegal killing of a gray whale by Makah tribal members was an infraction of
the IWC Schedule
- Indicated
that it plans on supporting Greenland’s request for an aboriginal subsistence
whaling quota of 10 humpback whales despite evidence of a significant commercial
element to Greenland’s current hunt and the gross over-estimation of its
aboriginal need for whale products
- Refused to
promote transparency and openness within IWC deliberations by opposing attempts
to include civil society to observe and participate in all work of the IWC and
any working groups
“Despite
promoting itself as a beacon of democracy and acting as a model for other
countries in regard to transparency and openness in governmental operations, the
Bush administration has decided to negotiate the future of the world’s whale in
secret,” adds Susan Millward, a research associate with AWI. “The desire of the
United States to conduct such deliberations without the accountability that
comes from public scrutiny appears indicative of its intent to abandon its
support for the whales in favor of support for the whalers.”
The United
States is one of 24 countries who will engage in secret meetings over the course
of the next year as they attempt to develop a package deal to “fix” the IWC
through a process devised and promoted by Dr. William Hogarth, the U.S.
Commissioner to the IWC and the current Chair of the international body. Dr.
Hogarth’s plan attempts to “fix” a convention that is not broken and is only at
a stalemate because of the unwillingness of Japan, Norway, and Iceland to comply
with international opinion and stop whaling coupled with the failure of the
current Administration to use all diplomatic and legal muscle to permanently end
whaling by these rogue nations.
For years,
the United States was considered a leader in the worldwide effort to protect and
conserve whales. Under the Bush administration, however, the United States’
whale conservation agenda has been replaced by a plan of compromise and
capitulation. Such a dramatic shift in policy is inconsistent with the will of
the vast majority of Americans who strongly oppose whaling. Reflecting the will
of the people on the issue, the United States House of Representatives, only
days ago, unanimously passed H.Con.Res. 350 demanding that the United States
strongly support whale conservation, oppose any weakening of the commercial
whaling moratorium approved by the IWC in 1982, and oppose any new form of
whaling.
“It is clear
from the actions of the United States at this week’s IWC meeting that the will
of the American public and of Congress itself is of no concern or consequence to
the Bush administration,” claims Schubert. “Yet again the arrogance of the Bush
administration is clearly on display as it undermines decades of conservation
gains for whales in a matter of days, abandons its principles of transparency,
and ignores the opinions of its own constituents and even Congress.” “In this
case, it’s not just the interests of the American people that are being
abandoned but also the future of the world’s whales.”
For over 57
years the Animal Welfare Institute has been the leading voice for
animals across the country and on Capitol Hill to reduce the sum
total of pain and fear inflicted on animals by humans. To learn more
about us, please visit
www.awionline.org.
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