What was Norway doing this summer when we were on holidays? Norway was killing whales! What was doing Norway when people were whalewatching? Norway was killing whales!
Every year, Norway announces that it will open its controversial commercial whaling season (3 months starting in May), and every year it increases its self appointed quota of Minke whales that it will slaughter for no good reason. But anyway, what good reasons could one have to kill these magnificent, intelligent creatures?
Norway is proud of killing whales. It claims that it’s part of their culture and that whaling is
practised on a small scale. But since the 1986 international whaling ban, Norway has killed 8,106 whales, and Norway’s Government has proudly announced that it has caught and killed 592 whales in the 2007 whaling season.
They also claim that the whales are a threat to fishstocks. Once again, their argument is not valid as human over-fishing is to blame for dwindling stocks, and this in turn is a threat to whales and the entire marine ecosystem.
So why is norway killing whales? For money, of course. The real goal of Norway’s whalers is to export to Japan where whale meat has become a luxuary food on the japanese market that can retail at 80£ per pound.
JOIN THE PROTESTS EVERY WEDNESDAY
Demo every Wednesday from 1pm to 3pm outside the norwegian embassy.
Royal norwegian embassy
34 Molesworth Street
Dublin 2, Ireland
Tel: +353 - 1 - 662 1800
Fax: +353 - 1 - 662 1890
Email: emb.dublin@mfa.no, Dublin