Australia’s environment minister
says government ‘deeply disappointed’ after Sea Shepherd photos show minke
whale killing in Antarctic sanctuary
Monday 16 January 2017 08.35 GMT
Australia’s federal environment
minister, Josh Frydenberg, has criticised Japan following the
release of photographs allegedly showing the slaughtering of protected
whales inside Australia’s Antarctic whale sanctuary.
Frydenberg’s statement came as
conservationists called for tougher action from Australia.
“The Australian government is
deeply disappointed that Japan
has decided to return to the Southern Ocean this summer to undertake so-called
‘scientific’ whaling,” Frydenberg said.
“Australia is opposed to all forms of
commercial and so-called ‘scientific’ whaling,” he said. “It is not necessary
to kill whales in order to study them.”
The photographs, taken by Sea Shepherd activists from a
helicopter, appear to show a dead minke on the deck of the Japanese whaler
Nisshin Maru at 11.34am on Sunday.
After the Japanese crew saw the
Sea Shepherd helicopter, they covered the harpoons and attempted to hide the
whale carcass with a tarpaulin, according to Sea Shepherd.
The images emerged on Sunday
afternoon while the Japanese prime minister, Shinzo Abe, was in
Australia on a state visit.
The slaughter was the first
documented killing since the international court of justice ruled
Japan’s Antarctic whaling illegal in 2014. So far the Australian government
has resisted calls to send official vessels to patrol its waters and intervene
in illegal whaling.
But Frydenberg said no country
has done more than Australia to try to end whaling.
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