20 years on and whales are under threat again

A double threat is looming for the world's largest mammals, many of them endangered species, in the coming year.

In the biggest whale slaughter for a generation, more than 2,000 animals are likely to be directly hunted by the three countries continuing whaling in defiance of world opinion, Japan, Norway and Iceland. And in a crucial political move, this year the pro-whaling nations look likely to achieve their first majority of votes in whaling's regulatory body, the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

The first development will be brutal, bloody and shocking to many people who might be under the impression that whaling is a thing of the past. But the second may be even more significant for whale welfare in the long term, for it would pave the way for an eventual resumption of commercial whaling, which the 1986 moratorium put on indefinite hold.

Japan is leading the way on both counts. Its whaling fleet is firing harpoons right now in the Antarctic Ocean, hunting 935 minke whales, more than double the number it took last year, all of them under the guise of "scientific" whaling - killing the animals allegedly for research purposes. This label is a fiction which fools no one, as whale meat, popular with Japanese consumers, is sold on the open market.

It is also hunting 10 endangered fin whales - the second-largest animal on earth, after the blue whale - and over the next two years will seek to harpoon 40 more fin whales, and 50 humpbacks, the big whales whose spectacular "breaching" - leaping from the water - delights observers on whale-watching cruises.

Norway, which is pursuing commercial whaling openly by simply declining to adhere to the moratorium, is following close behind, with another leap in its planned kills in the coming year. Four days before Christmas, the Norwegian government announced it would increase its 2006 whale hunting quota by a further 250 animals to 1,052, following a unanimous recommendation by the Storting (Norwegian parliament).

Iceland, which recommenced whaling three years ago, also under the "scientific" label, killed 39 minkes last year and is expected to hunt a similar number in 2006.

That all adds up to by far the bloodiest bout of whale slaughter since the days of full-scale commercial whaling and has greatly angered environmental campaigners.

"People should wake up to the scale of what is happening this year," said the whaling campaigner for Greenpeace UK, Willie McKenzie. "Politicians who are supposed to be anti-whaling especially need to wake up to it, and press their governments to put as much effort into saving the world's whale populations as the whaling countries are doing to exploit them."

Greenpeace has decided to take the fight directly to the Japanese, and has sent two of its large campaigning vessels, Arctic Sunrise and Esperanza, to the Southern Ocean to try to hinder whaling operations directly. In the past 10 days there have been a series of extraordinary confrontations between Greenpeace and the Japanese fleet, which is based around the factory ship Nisshin Maru.

In actions strongly reminiscent of those which first made the group famous in the 1970s, Greenpeace activists in small inflatable boats have been trying to block the harpooners' line of fire and, on a number if occasions, have succeeded - making the idea of Save The Whale a reality.

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