 |
|
Actress Pamela
Anderson (Reuters / Mario Anzuoni)
|
The Baywatch
series star actress Pamela Anderson has written an open letter to the Russian
President, urging him to use his authority over Russian territorial waters to
block the passage of a cargo ship carrying 1,700 tonnes of fin whale meat to
Japan.
In a “personal request” letter to
Vladimir Putin, Anderson writes that out of their “mutual love for animals
and a deep respect for nature,” Putin should step in and block the “illegal” cargo
of St. Kitt’s-registered vessel Winter Bay from sailing from Iceland through
the Northeast Passage to Japan.
Russian waters are allegedly the only way to get
the meat to Japan as according to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, Winter
Bay will not risk passing through the Suez or Panama canals because of
international laws and logistic restrictions concerning whale meat.
RT.com report continues:
 |
|
Cutting up the whale. Photo: AFP/Getty Images
|
The actress considers the Russian president as
the last beacon of hope to stop the vessel, currently docked in Norway and
awaiting the clearance of the Arctic route.
“President Putin, you can stop this illegal
transit by forbidding this vessel from carrying a cargo of endangered Fin whale
meat through Russian waters to Japan,” Anderson wrote as she urged Putin
to consider the matter.
Last week the environmental and animal rights
activist group Avaaz started a petition asking Timothy Harris, Prime Minister
of the Caribbean island of St. Kitts & Nevis, to deflag the freighter,
which would prevent the ship from sailing. So far the petition has
gathered almost 1 million signatures.
But despite such massive support, Anderson is
placing her hopes and the hopes of all those who signed the petition on Putin. “Your
decision could put an end to the needless slaughter of endangered whales by
Iceland,” the actress wrote.
In 1986, the International Whaling Commission
(IWC) introduced commercial whaling moratorium in order to increase the whale
stock. Yet pro-whaling countries, Norway, Greenland and Iceland, still continue
to hunt limited number of whales as whale products play an important role in
the nutritional and cultural life of native peoples. The hunting is done through the Special
Permit Whaling or Scientific Whaling with responsibility for setting and
regulating these catches allocated to individual governments, not the IWC.
“These whales were killed illegally in violation
of the International Whaling Commission’s moratorium on commercial whaling. It
is also illegal to kill Fin whales and to engage in the trade of endangered
species,” Anderson wrote.
 |
|
See the first fin whale being dragged into shore
by whaling boat #iceland
#whaling http://bit.ly/1KqJnFh (Image
source: Iceland Monitor)
|
In Iceland, whose Hvalur Hf company supplied meat
to Winter Bay, whaling is allowed under
strict quota systems. The annual quota is 30 minke whales and nine fin whales.
The numbers allocated to commercial whaling is quite small in comparison to the
overall IWC estimates of whales around Icelandic shores.
ICW's most recent abundance estimate of common
minke whales in Icelandic coastal waters is 43,600 alongside 25,800 of fin
whales.
In Japan, the story with
scientific whaling is tricky after the International Court of Justice judgment
forced Tokyo to end its programme in March 2014. Some 10,000 minke whales were
killed in the Antarctic by Japanese vessels between 1987 and 2014 under a
special IWC clause that permits scientific whaling. While Japan is trying to
convince the ICW that the country needs whaling, it is forced to get its whale
meat from other countries, in this case Iceland.
No comments:
Post a Comment