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Stories from IWC ECO Vol LI No.1 May 25, 1999 (Grenada)
Article Index:
1) Irish Baloney Dictionaries sometimes provide interesting insights as well as definitions of words. The Concise Oxford, practically a Bible to the English language, defines the charming old Irish way of speaking called "blarney" as "nonsense". In America, where English speech acquired a raw edge, "nonsense" is commonly referred to as "baloney" after a cheap food product made from mixing scraps. Everyone knows baloney is suspect, but it gets eaten anyway. In the crossover between cultures, the Irish have managed to make blarney appealing, so we love to hear words roll off the lips of those who've kissed the stone. But the Concise Oxford is clear on the linguistic issue. Blarney is baloney. Nonsense is nonsense. If the "Irish Proposal" had come from Japan or Norway, or Korea or Denmark for that matter, it would not have seen the light of day. It would have been clearly identified as what it is, a device for ending the moratorium and legitimizing worldwide commercial whaling once again. It's because of its source, not because of its content, that Michael Canny's fuzzy idea gets treated seriously. Ireland, after all, stands clearly on the side of the whales. It will never allow whales to be killed, captured, or harmed in any way inside waters it controls. That's Irish law. Bravo Ireland! Someone speaking for Ireland naturally must have the best interests of whales in their heart, so even if what they say sounds odd it's best to listen, if only out of politeness. We think that's what's been happening at the IWC ever since Monaco. Possibly the setting in which the Irish dice were first tossed was partly to blame, but we also think it's way past time to stop gambling with the fate of the whales and get on with the real job at hand. That job, to go right back to the beginning when the ICRW was signed in a context of chaos, is to ensure that whales thrive and that the whaling industry develops in an orderly manner. If anything is clear from the sorry history of whaling, it's that whales were battered almost to oblivion, and that the whaling industry fell under its own fire. Everyone knows that whales were pursued ruthlessly without a thought for their good, and everyone knows that the whaling industry was consumed by greed. We see no evidence that anything has changed on the whalers' side. What we do see, thank God, is evidence that some species and populations of whales areslowly moving back from the brink they were forced to. Some, like the California Gray, may even be ok. But does that mean the moratorium should now end? We think not. Consider this... there never was a moratorium. The whales have not yet been given the chance they need, deserve, and must have. Instead, they've continued being brutalized by canny evasions and infringements of the rules and spirit under which the IWC is supposed to operate. We say, let's have a real moratorium, and let's make it last long enough for the thoughtful evaluation it was created for to be done properly. 50 years sounds about right to us, and about right for an organisation that's spent its first 50 years doing just about everything wrong. The breathing space a real moratorium will provide will help the whaling industry as much as it helps whales. It's already obvious that far more money is to be made from keeping whales alive, protecting their habitats, learning more about them and ensuring their needs are met, than from blasting their bodies, torturing their minds and cashing in on the choice cuts. Whale watching, not whale killing, is the true and only sustainable future for the whaling industry. The sooner this confused body gets around to understanding that, the better for all concerned, including the whales. We'll then find something surprising happening. The whaling industry, defined as those groups who benefit financially from the systematic exploitation of whales, will then proceed to develop in an orderly manner. And that ain't baloney. 2) U.S.A. becomes pirate whaler On May 17, non-nutritional cultural whaling began from the mainland United States as the Makah tribe killed their first migrating gray whale.... and the USA became a pirate whaling nation. Protesters swarmed around Neah Bay, especially angered by the pursuit of mother-calf pairs, and the US Coast Guard mobilized to run interference for the Makah. Over and over, media stories stated the Makah had been granted permission by the IWC in Monaco to kill whales. This is not true. It is an American lie. Remember that long debate about Makah whaling in Monaco? After failing in Aberdeen, the proposal was re-engineered by the US to hide within the traditional Russian quota. But upon arrival in Monaco, it ran into a bitter deadlock. Delegation after delegation took the floor to support a quota for starving Chukotka native people, and to oppose the Makah request on the grounds that it did not meet IWC requirements for classification as aboriginal subsistence whaling. After a long night of hassle, compromise language was agreed for an ASW quota for the North Pacific population of California Gray Whales. When it came to the floor, the language of the resolution carefully made it clear the quota was for aboriginals "whose cultural and nutritional needs have been recognized by the IWC". The USA insisted the words "by the IWC" be deleted, and eventually Australia and others agreed, stating it to be obvious that all resolutions taken by the IWC refer to the IWC. The quota then passed by consensus. The language of the resolution broke the deadlock because it separated the Makah from the allotment. Their nutritional needs were not recognized. The US delegation weren't scripted for defeat, so they claimed victory... no doubt figuring that a lie told often enough supersedes the truth. They hit the ornate lobby outside the plenary and immediately launched spin control. It worked. The Seattle Times dutifully reported that a Makah whaling quota had been granted by the IWC. Celebration broke out in Neah Bay. Afterwards, the words used by the U.S. government to describe what happened magically transformed the IWC's language into "aborigines whose nutritional or cultural needs have been recognized." Thus, in one fell swoop, by changing "and" to "or", non-nutritional cultural whaling was created. Japan celebrated, we cringed. Was there a quota issued to the Makah by the IWC? Secretary Gambell says no. The transcript from the Monaco meeting says no. But the US government was determined to hear a yes and self-allocated a quota without worrying about nutritional need. The US government issued the Makah a permit to kill whales, no doubt figuring their own spin compensated for the lack of IWC approval. Now harpoons have been hurled, a whale struck and killed. 3) Intrepid protestor paddles in Remember Muscat, the Al Bustan Palace, the solid gold faucets? Ok, maybe you didn't make it to the top floor. But how about Bernhard Bechter? You may not know his name but you'll probably remember the lone protester standing outside the palace doors experiencing the heat the rest of us noticed but didn't have to deal with... we were inside while he was out. That was Bernhard. Austrian, he'd bicycled in from Vienna for the pleasure. That journey for the whales took him two months. Cast your mind back to Monaco. There were three protesters then, and they managed to spend a night in jail before being allowed to stand (politely) outside in the street. Bernhard was one. So how about this meeting in yet another far off corner too hard and too expensive for most of the protest crowd to get to? Yep... Bernhard's here! This time he's crossed the Atlantic, the Canadian Arctic, and travelled on down through the US & Central America to Venezuela, and then on to Grenada... in a kayak! After six months on the "road" Bernhard paddled in a couple of days ago. Watch for him... and think about it! 4) Welcome to Club Dead Imagine yourself on a white sand beach far enough away from the office to forget who you are, sipping a frosted margarita or something more exotic, surrounded by warm air and looking out over turquoise blue water that invites you in. White sails dot the horizon and in the background attentive eyes await your every whim. You know you're in Heaven. A commotion intrudes. The white sails come closer, and with them a rowdy crowd of boats slowly towing something towards shore. You watch lazily, amused by the antics as the procession nears, and then you leap to your feet pointing, speechless. The water has turned red, and behind those boats float two huge forms, one much bigger than the other with a thin floppy white appendage thrust carelessly skyward. You know what they are, just the day before you'd taken photos of them swimming so beautifully together in the bay. You run.... away. Such was the scene at Mustique on March 6th when a humpback mother and her new little baby were harpooned by the Caribbean's "aboriginal" whalers. A speedboat and the local ferry were employed in this oh-so-traditional slaughter, and soon the mama whaleprovided additional entertainment by creating a new fountain in the harbor, spraying blood for almost a half hour with her dying gasps. Plans to make a pitch at this IWC meeting for a doubling of the current aboriginal subsistence quota of two humpbacks yearly for St. Vincent/ Bequia were shelved after the gruesome kill. Renewal of the existing permit will be opposed by Britain and, we hope, others who must see that St. Vincent whaler Athneal Ollivierre's license to kill is unjustified. We question why St. Vincent has an Aboriginal Subsistence Whaling permit at all. There are no "aborigines" left there; the killing of mother and calves violates the ICRW; and products from the butchery are sold as far away as Trinidad. For years the quota has been winked and nodded at by those arguing that Mr. Athneal is ancient and without proteges, and that the hunt would die on its own any minute. It's now clear this "last" whaler intends passing on his "skills". Even more clearly, the IWC must stop the barbaric practice. 5) The evolution of a treaty Sigh. It's that time of year. It comes suddenly: the adrenalin rush, heightened perception, nightly trysts, intense conversation, maddening energy. Love in Spring? I wish. No, it's simply IWC time, a unique season of its own. A season with a rhythm, many acts to be played. The entry (Who's here?), the deception (Ah, an easy year), the battle (Oh my God, the whalers are going to get THAT resolution passed?), the climax (Next year I will have a plan to defeat whaling forever, I promise.) Yes dear, we know. Tomorrow, tomorrow... is only a year away. Those of us who attend IWC meetings year after year, who know the drum beat, the rhythm, the ups and downs, the minutiae, forget that the Whale transcends this one month a year. The world turns, yet we forget. The Irish Commissioner bemoans we are standing still. Tisch, Tisch, it is his illusion. During IWC season, we live in a microcosm, we enter Wonderland. The world outside this Grenadian rabbit hole evolves, even as we believe it stands still. International law is created not only through the jousting, the inevitable match of the Mad Hatter (Hey ho, I'm a nasty whaler) and our sweet heroine, Alice (this is my 556th whale watch). It is created by custom. Customary law is the result of a general consensus to create binding rules on all states. Treaties may codify customary law. Treaty law may become customary law and thus, bind even those countries who never intended to be bound. Lastly, customary law may change Treaty rules. Customary law, though less obvious, is as legally binding as treaty law. The generally held view of customary law, endorsed by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Continental Shelf Cases (Yes Norway, that case applied to you) presumes two constitutive elements: (1) a general practice of States and (2) the acceptance by States of the general practice as law. In legal speak the requirements of customary law are: duration, uniformity and consistency, generality and a sense of legal obligation.The ICJ and international legal scholars are of the view that duration need not be long, if the practice is widespread and consistent. Yet complete uniformity is not required, as long as there is substantial agreement and uniformity with respect to the customary norm. (You mean like a long standing and well recognized indefinite moratorium?) Widespread does not mean universal. If the practice is generally accepted and increasingly so, this may be enough to establish international custom. Lastly, a state doesn't need to be happy about the custom, it needs only to feel constrained to follow the norm. We are evolving. Japan knows it, Norway too. Why else would Japan spend millions of Yen each year buying support for its whaling policy? Can one buy one's way into a customary norm? Absolutely not. For in such a case Opinio Juris, or a sense of legal obligation, is missing. Japan is trying to change the tide, to hold the world still, to stop evolution. A last battle, you say? Yes, the last gasp of a dying tradition that seeks to hold time still. A regressive tradition where manhood is proven through the slaying of mighty beasts and man believed he was not safe unless he slew. Hark...I hear the song the whalers sing: "We must kill the beast before it eats our food. Come lad, grab your spear and hunt the beast until it is gone from our lands." We are evolving...Thank God... into the new Millennium, a new age, a new tradition... 6) Whale poison Along with the damage the IWC is doing to the cause of First Nations' by refusing to clearly draw the line between subsistence needs and outrageous conduct in the modern world, are the health dangers it continues to impose on aboriginal people who consume whale meat and blubber. We say "impose" advisedly, because the IWC ducks the issue by not assuming a full mandate for small cetaceans, and because its Scientific Committee, which knows quite enough already, doesn't tell Commissioners what they should do. That, put plainly, is to sound the alarm. People who eat small cetaceans are contaminating themselves with intolerable levels of pollutants, including PCBs, DDT and mercury. Arctic mothers' breast milk is poisoning their babies, Faeroese children are being brain damaged, the people of Greenland are eating 10 times as much contaminated food as is safe. Why is this unconscionable situation allowed to continue? We suspect the answer is an old story... it's mostly native people who get shafted, so who cares? Back to Eco Main Page. |
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