Australia, Japan Relations Strained by Commercial Whaling
Australia brought to international court its claim that Japan had abused article eight of the treaty on scientific whaling to disguise its commercial whaling under the pretext of scientific research. The accusation revealed that there were over 10,000 Antarctic minke whales sacrificed under Japan's 'whaling for Science.'
Today, Japan had an answer to Australia's accusation saying that the country, a previous friend, is guilty of having a "selective moral judgment" through tolerating environmentalist activists, like Sea Shepherd, which had been attacking Japanese whaling fleets.
In a report from ABC News, lawyer for Japan Payam Akhavan said that Australia disregarded other country's culture with its accusation. "If the hijacking of the convention, if the politicization of science persists, if the tradition and cultures of people are sacrificed to appease other people's sentiments and selective moral judgment, if international law continues to be disregarded, soon there will be no whaling nations at IWC (International Whaling Commission)."
Japan also said that due to Australia's another controversial accusation against Denmark the country is already at the brink of leaving IWC. Australia go up against Denmark's unilateral ruling of quotas for subsistence whaling by indigenous cultures - another proof of Australia's "selective moral judgment said Japan.
Japan is nearing its closing arguments before the international court by July 17 but the court will have its final verdict after several months.
With this, Japan thinks that whatever the international court decision is, Australia will persist in its anti-whaling crusade.
Mr Akhavan said, "For Australia this court is nearly one instrument among others to achieve unyielding purpose of imposing its will on Japan at one way or another. Australia will stop at nothing."
In its answer to Japan's accusation of 'selective moral judgment', Bill Campbell QC led for Australia's case uphold that Japan's whaling is done purely for commercial purpose.
Mr Campbell said, "The position remains fundamentally the same; we say that what's going on is commercial whaling. We don't believe it falls within the research exception, and that remains the case despite what Japan said this morning."
On Monday, July 15, a report from Sydney Morning Herald said that Mr Akhavan said that Japan opted to remain a member of IWC because of the country's sincerity to the rule of law and peaceful dispute settlement.
Mr Akhavan told the court on Monday that "Australia comes before this court to take advantage of that commitment, to unfairly and unreasonably portray Japan as a rogue state at IWC, to level accusations of bad faith against what it deems to be a friendly state that it can mistreat with impunity."
He further told court that even with the case just being heard, Australia's Attorney-general, mark Dreyfus made it clear that whatever the IWC decision is, whether Australia lost the case, it will continue to campaign against Japan's whaling activities.
For Mr Akhavan this was a clear indication of harassment saying "The Attorney-general makes clear that Australia will persist harassing and confronting Japan if this court does not give Australia the decision that it wants."
Australia had already finished its arguments last week through Counsel James Crawford upholding Australia's allegation of commercial whaling against Japan.