WHEREAS Article VIII of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling provided that any Contracting Government may grant special permits authorising their nationals to kill whales for scientific purposes;

RECALLING that the Government of Japan started research whaling on minke whales in the North Pacific in 1994 and then expanded the program last year to include Bryde’s and sperm whales, despite numerous concerns raised by the Scientific Committee and the Commission;

WHEREAS because of the timing of the Scientific Committee in 2002, the Committee will not be able to review and comment on any new JARPNII proposal before the start of scientific whaling next year;

NOTING the concern of many members of the Scientific Committee that the lack of any quantifiable objectives in JARPNII effectively means that no reasonable performance standard has been set with which to judge the success or failure of the feasibility phase of the research programme;

NOTING also that more than 600 whales have been killed in the North Pacific since the start of the programme;

FURTHER NOTING that the data collected by lethal sampling of sperm, minke and Bryde’s whales in JARPN II are not essential in the context of the RMP.

NOW THEREFORE THE COMMISSION:

AFFIRMS that data gathered under JARPNII on interactions between whales and prey species are not sufficient to justify the killing of these whales for research purposes;

PROPOSES that any information needed on stock structure can and should be obtained using non-lethal means;

STRONGLY URGES the Government of Japan for the reasons given above to refrain from issuing any special scientific permit for whaling under JARPN II. If the Government of Japan nevertheless considers issuing a permit in 2002, the Commission STRONGLY URGES that it not be issued until the end of July 2002, to give the Government of Japan adequate time to take into account the views of the Scientific Committee and the Commission.