The latest media reports say that the Japanese have resumed whaling operations, even with the Australian Customs vessel Oceanic Viking watching what the fleet does.
As far I as I am concerned, this goes to prove a couple of things.
Firstly, that regardless of what legal action Australia may take against the Japanese whalers, they have no intention of stopping their supposed research. All Japan has to do if threaten a long legal battle or to stop trading with Australia, and the government will fall to it’s knees apologising, and begging to be forgiven.
Proof of this can be shown by how quiet the Minister for the Environment, Peter Garret has been throughout all of this. There has not been one ministerial press release about the issue of whaling since he took office. He has released statements about the phase out of plastic bags, the unfortunate death of Heath Ledger, and even taken a flight down to Antarctica for the inaugural flight of Airlink.
The only time that whaling has been mentioned was in a joint press release on 18 December 2008 with the Minister for Foreign Affairs. He even has a whale pictured on the header of his personal web page. I suppose only time will tell if the Rudd government will follow through with the promises they made when they were in opposition.
