U.N. to Japan: Stop whale hunting – Three dead minke whales lie on the deck of the Japanese whaling vessel Nisshin Maru in the Southern Ocean.
(CNN)Japan's
whaling fleet has returned with more than 300 whales harvested from
Antarctic waters, according to the country's Fisheries Agency.
A
four-ship fleet from Japan's Institute of Cetacean Research traveled to
the Antarctic Ocean and killed 333 minke whales. Some 230 were female;
about 90% of these were pregnant, according to the report.
The
research was conducted as part of an effort to understand the minke
whale populations in the Antarctic Ocean, the Japanese Ministry of
Fisheries said in a statement on its website. The purpose was to study
the best methods for managing minke populations, the ministry said. It
said there were no incidents with anti-whaling activists.
In
the past, opponents, including New Zealand and Australia, have raised
concerns about the legitimacy of the scientific research contention. In
2014, the United Nation's International Court of Justice ordered Japan
to halt its whaling program, over concerns of its whaling activities in
the Antarctic region.
On social media, Greenpeace, a longtime opponent of Japan's whaling program, stated in a tweet: "The Japanese whaling fleet defies the UN and kills 333 whales, including 200 pregnant mothers."
Japan
has continued to reject international orders to stop its program,
alleging that its whaling activities are vital to a larger body of
research, as opposed to commercial purposes.
Scientific research gets exemption from the 1986 international ban on commercial whaling.
But the International Court of Justice rejected Japan's scientific
claims and ordered an end to its JARPA II research, which claims to
study the maintenance and improvement of the minke whale population and
the effects of environmental changes on the whale's food supply, according to its website.
Japan
launched a new research program after the court ruling in 2014 that
says 333 whales could be killed annually, according to Japan's Fisheries Agency and Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The four vessels left the port of Shimonoseki, southwest of Tokyo, in December 2015 and returned Thursday. The expedition was part of a 12-year program that will kill 4,000 minke whales.
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