Whale Wars/Headscratchers
- How is it that this isn't international piracy on the high seas? Even if you agree with their cause, they're attacking other vessels on the open seas.
- As I understand it, the legal situation is extremely murky. If Japan is indeed lying about the hunt being For Science! rather than traditional whaling (as many people believe), then the vessels being attacked would frequently themselves be violating various international laws and treaties. This is most likely why no naval force ever confronts either group.
- Japan's "science" is determining safe harvest levels for whenever the "moratorium" (not ban, moratorium) by the IWC is lifted. Granted, it's not going to happen, due to political pressure and all the landlocked states that are full members of a maritime commission just to keep the moratorium in place, but that's their story, and they're sticking to it.
- Yeah, but if the Japanese ships "might" be doing something illegal, this is different from the anti-whalers attacking them, which is definitely illegal. I don't think it makes a difference that the Japanese may or may not be doing something illegal themselves. What the anti-whalers do is illegal.
- That may be true, but actually enforcing laws in international waters is nearly impossible. And both the Japanese whalers, and the Sea Shepherds, know this.
- As I understand it, the legal situation is extremely murky. If Japan is indeed lying about the hunt being For Science! rather than traditional whaling (as many people believe), then the vessels being attacked would frequently themselves be violating various international laws and treaties. This is most likely why no naval force ever confronts either group.