Stop Japanese Whaling in Australian Antartica
Your comments please

Sea Shepherd Receives Message From the Australian Government

Captain Paul Watson received an email from the Australian government.
The letter and Captain Watson's response are reprinted below:

From: Donne, Tony
Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2008 23:36
Subject: Message to Captain WATSON on behalf of the Australian
Government [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

Dear Captain WATSON

I have been asked to transmit the following message on behalf of the
Australian Government.

Following the transfer by the Oceanic Viking of two of your crew
members from the Yushin Maru No. 2 to the Steve Irwin on 18 January
2008, you made the public statement that having delivered a letter of
protest to the Japanese whaling fleet, you did not see an incident of
this kind occurring again.

The Australian Government is concerned that your recent public
statements indicate that you may be contemplating another boarding of
a Japanese vessel in the Southern Ocean.

Weather and sea conditions in the Southern Ocean, and the very long
distances involved, mean that the area is an inherently dangerous one
in which to operate. For this reason, the Australian Government has
continually called on all parties in the Southern Ocean to exercise
restraint.

As the Australian Government has previously outlined, now that the
monitoring mission of the Oceanic Viking has been completed, neither
protest nor whaling vessels can in any way assume that the Australian
Government will be in a position to respond immediately in the event
of any serious incident.

You should also understand that it may not be possible for the
Australian Government to intervene, in the event of another boarding
incident, to facilitate the transfer of people from one vessel to
another on the high seas.

Crew members of ships in the Southern Ocean should not attempt to
board other vessels. All parties should understand that to do so may
well be contrary to the law of the flag state of any such vessel.

For this reason, the Australian Government once again calls on you -
as it does all parties - to exercise the utmost restraint in your
activities in the Southern Ocean.

The Australian Government strongly discourages activity which could be
illegal or unsafe activity which could lead to injury or loss of life
at sea.

TONY DONNE
A/DUTY COORDINATOR
INTELLIGENCE

Reply from Captain Watson:

Dear Mr. Donne,

Thank-you for your message.

We did say to the media at the time that we saw no need to deliver a
another message to the Japanese notifying them of the fact that there
was an Australian Federal Court ruling that very day prohibiting
Japanese whalers from killing whales in Australian territorial waters.

We never said that we would rule out boarding Japanese vessels as a
tactic. If the non-violent boarding of an illegal whaler can shut down
illegal whaling for days or weeks then we believe this is a valid
tactic.

In fact at no time did any representative of the Australian government
ever speak to me directly about tactics, plans or issues. I never
spoke to a representative of the Australian government or the Federal
police to the fact that we would not board a ship again if
circumstances required us to.

We regard the Japanese whaling ships as poaching vessels. I believe
that Australia has boarded poaching vessels many times in the past and
rightfully so. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has been working
in the Galapagos in partnership with the Galapagos National Park
rangers and we have boarded shark poaching vessels on many occasions.
We have also boarded shark poaching vessels in the waters of Cocos
Island National Park off Costa Rica and in 2001 we seized the
Ecuadorian long-liner San Jose in the Cocos Island National Park
Marine Reserve.

The Japanese whaling fleet is presently hunting whales in the
Australian Antarctic Territory despite an Australian Federal Court
order specifically prohibiting the killing of whales in these specific
waters.

Japan is targeting endangered whales (Fins) in violation of the
Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).
Japan is violating numerous regulations of the International Whaling
Commission.

In your message you relayed it was stated "The Australian Government
strongly discourages activity which could be illegal or unsafe
activity which could lead to injury or loss of life at sea."
Respectfully this must include illegal whaling and illegal whaling is
causing the loss of life at sea - specifically thousands of whales.

What is Australia going to do to protect the lives of the whales
presently threatened by illegal Japanese whaling activity?

When the Australian government calls for the exercising of "restraint"
I would expect this to include the Federal Australian court order that
used that exact same word in calling for the "restraint" of all
Japanese whaling operations.

Last month it was the Japanese who requested that the Oceanic Viking
remove two of my crew and return them to the Steve Irwin. I made no
such request but I was willing to cooperate with both the Japanese
Captain and the Captain of the Oceanic Viking to have the men
transferred back to my ship.

I do not expect to and I will not request Australia to intervene in
the event any of my crew are once again held hostage by the Japanese.
I would find it interesting to see how Australia would react to having
an Australian citizen seized in the territorial waters of Australia by
illegal Japanese whalers and taken against their will to Japan.

The question must then be asked: Is the line on the nautical charts
that indicates the EEZ for Australia 200 miles off the Australian
Antarctic coast to be taken seriously? Is this or is this not a
legitimate territorial claim? We have been operating under the
assumption that these waters do belong to Australia as we have been
assuming that an Australian Federal Court order must be worth more
than the paper it is printed on. Is this Court Order just a joke to
appease Australians who want to see something done about whaling? Is
this all just posing and posturing or is Australia serious about
ending illegal whaling?

This is my fourth season in these waters. I am well aware of how
dangerous and remote this area of the world is. I have never asked nor
have I ever expected Australia to come to our rescue in the event of
an accident.

The Australian government can expect that the Sea Shepherd
Conservation Society will adhere to our long-standing policy of not
causing injury to the criminals we oppose. We will however take the
required risk to oppose unlawful Japanese whaling operations and we do
so within the definition of intervention in the United Nations World
Charter for Nature that allows for non-governmental enforcement of
international conservation laws and regulations.

I would like to report a crime. The Japanese have eight ships
presently inside the Australian Antarctic Territorial waters and these
ships are engaged in unlawful activities and they are doing so in
blatant contempt of the Australian Federal Court ruling issued January
15th that prohibits the killing of whales in these waters. What is the
Australian government going to do about this?

Sincerely,

Captain Paul Watson
Master of the Steve Irwin
Founder and President of the
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society
Your comments please

at

http://groups.google.com/group/austr...iticsmoderated

Godspeed to Sea Shepherd http://www.seashepherd.org/ for their heroic
effort to stop Japan's criminal enterprise of slaughtering thousands
of whales annually. It is time Japan and all other Asian countries
enter the 21st Century and stop eating whale blubber, dogs, cats, bear
paws, ad naseum. To learn the scope of animal cruelty that goes on in
Asian nations (most which have no animal cruelty laws) do a google
search. It truly is outrageous.

wrote:
Godspeed to Sea Shepherd http://www.seashepherd.org/ for their heroic
effort to stop Japan's criminal enterprise of slaughtering thousands
of whales annually. It is time Japan and all other Asian countries
enter the 21st Century and stop eating whale blubber, dogs, cats, bear
paws, ad naseum. To learn the scope of animal cruelty that goes on in
Asian nations (most which have no animal cruelty laws) do a google
search. It truly is outrageous.

What is outrageous is that we look the other way and buy everything they
churn out from their filthy factories.

"If there's a Hell below we're all gonna go"

dave wrote:

wrote:
Godspeed to Sea Shepherd http://www.seashepherd.org/ for their heroic
effort to stop Japan's criminal enterprise of slaughtering thousands
of whales annually. It is time Japan and all other Asian countries
enter the 21st Century and stop eating whale blubber, dogs, cats, bear
paws, ad naseum. To learn the scope of animal cruelty that goes on in
Asian nations (most which have no animal cruelty laws) do a google
search. It truly is outrageous.

What is outrageous is that we look the other way and buy everything they
churn out from their filthy factories.

"If there's a Hell below we're all gonna go"



I've been sending


"Dead Whales = No Sales"


to a few Japanese companies. It's a good a slogan as any and it may get
their attention.











mike

m II wrote:

dave wrote:

wrote:
Godspeed to Sea Shepherd http://www.seashepherd.org/ for their heroic
effort to stop Japan's criminal enterprise of slaughtering thousands
of whales annually. It is time Japan and all other Asian countries
enter the 21st Century and stop eating whale blubber, dogs, cats, bear
paws, ad naseum. To learn the scope of animal cruelty that goes on in
Asian nations (most which have no animal cruelty laws) do a google
search. It truly is outrageous.

What is outrageous is that we look the other way and buy everything they
churn out from their filthy factories.

"If there's a Hell below we're all gonna go"

I've been sending

"Dead Whales = No Sales"

to a few Japanese companies. It's a good a slogan as any and it may get
their attention.

If you think for a moment that they'll listen to a drunken dumbass Canuck you'd
be sadly mistaken!

On Mar 1, 8:18 am, dave

What is outrageous is that we look the other way and buy everything they
churn out from their filthy factories.

"We"? Don't include me because I long ago opted out of the system.
Opting instead for simple living as opposed to the destructive crass
consumerism the corporate oligarchy jams down the masses throats
24/7.

But your larger point is well taken and on the mark.
Lenin said "Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang
them." One can't even use that line anymore because the communists
are now selling the rope.

wrote:
On Mar 1, 8:18 am, dave

What is outrageous is that we look the other way and buy everything they
churn out from their filthy factories.

"We"? Don't include me because I long ago opted out of the system.
Opting instead for simple living as opposed to the destructive crass
consumerism the corporate oligarchy jams down the masses throats
24/7.

But your larger point is well taken and on the mark.
Lenin said "Capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang
them." One can't even use that line anymore because the communists
are now selling the rope.



There are two entities that will grow unchecked until they kill the
host; one is a malignant tumor; the other is unregulated capitalism.

They want to create chaos then offer strict measures as a cure. We are
screwed.