Chris Butler-Stroud comments

Posted in: Japanese politicians and whalers ignore criticism as whaling industry is revived See in context

Japanese whaling policy is a complex product of domestic political forces, an industry maintained by direct and indirect subsidies, and, as noted in this article, an increasing nationalistic whaling narrative. 

This nationalistic linkage to whaling goes back to at least 1982. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), then, as now, wishing to shore up its rural political support, including from fishing communities, has been careful to back the establishment's whaling position.

Indeed, with Prime Minister Shinzō Abe’s parliamentary constituency including Shimonoseki and with the LDP Security General, Toshihiro Nikai constituency being Wakayama Prefecture, we should not be surprised that their personal political interests dominate Japan’s international position on whaling.

This nationalism that blights Japan’s whaling position also perverts Japan’s overseas aid programme (ODA). Whilst Japan has been rightly lauded for using overseas aid to help developing countries, its use of aid with regard to fisheries and whaling in particular have been condemned; embarrassing Japan internationally and tarnishing Japan’s record.

The Kuranari Doctrine of 1987  attempted to set out a multidimensional approach to Japanese ODA and foreign policy, but in 1999, Hiroaki Kameya, the then vice-minister for fisheries, went further, stating with respect to the International Whaling Commission (IWC),

‘We would like to utilise overseas development aid as a practical means to promote nations to join, expanding grant-aid towards non-member countries which support Japan's claim.’

In 2001, Masayuki Komatsu, who has previously served as head of Japan’s Fisheries Agency’s International Affairs Division as well as a representative of Japan at the IWC, gave an interview to the Australian ABC network in 2001, in which he stated,

‘Japan does not have a military power, unlike the US and Australia. You may dispatch your, you know, military power to East Timor, that is not the case of Japan. Japanese means are simply diplomatic communication and ODAs. So, in order to get appreciation over Japan’s position, of course, you know that is natural that we must resort on those two major tools, so I think there is nothing wrong.’

In the same interview the then New Zealand Prime Minister, Helen Clark was quoted in reaction to Japan’s admission, as saying,

‘It is just outrageous to use aid money to buy votes on this issue, indeed on any issue, internationally development aid is supposed to be for development not for procuring a vote for purposes like this.’

We now know that human activity has removed some 80% of the biomass of whales and dolphins form the ocean in the last 100 years. Indeed, almost three million great whales were killed in commercial whaling operations in the 20th century; more than two million on their feeding grounds in the Southern Ocean.

We now also know that whales play a critical role in climate mitigation and ensuring we the healthy seas that Japanese fishermen rely on. I did a quick estimate which suggests that since Japan’s disregard of the IWC 1982 moratorium, the 22,000 plus whales Japanese whalers have killed could be equivalent to the impact of taking over $400 million dollars out of carbon mitigation efforts.

The recent decision by Japan to apparently disregard the IWC's scientific committee's critiques and to withdraw from the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) appears to increasingly indicate that Japan's powerful Ministry of Fisheries seeks not be bound by international norms with respect to whaling and should be a warning bell for any nations engaged in any resource access debate with Japan.

The withdraw of Japan from the jurisdiction of the ICJ and its preference for any future adjudication under other provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) may evidence an underlying strategy of increasingly militating against the effects of multilateral governance regimes when it inconveniences them.

As a closing note, Japan will never achieve its ambition of a permanent seat on the UN Security Council whilst it continues to undermine international law and continues to rob other nations of a vital resource in our battle against climate change - all in pursuit of a few people’s selfish nationalist agendas.

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