Japan, Netherlands agree to ensure maritime safety over antiwhaling

Tuesday 27th October, 06:20 AM JST

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14 Comments

spudman at 08:55 AM JST - 27th October

Only injuries are deaths were on the Japanese whaling ships with no effort from the Sea Shepherd.In fact they declined aid from the sea shepherd. Losers. Maybe they should ask Japan to take better care of their people first.
davidattokyo at 09:18 AM JST - 27th October

This is just lip service from the Dutch I fear.

spudman, indeed the Japanese should sort out their on board safety issues. That however is certainly not an excuse or an invitation for the SSCS lunatics to go smashing their boat in to the Japanese vessels repeatedly. (Indeed, may I ask if you really think that?)
spudman at 09:30 AM JST - 27th October

(Indeed, may I ask if you really think that?)

That SS repeatedly rams Japanese whalers? Nah only a couple of times and the whalers steered towards the SS ship on a couple of occasions. Cool heads should prevail and the Japanese should try hunting closer to home. Tradition would mandate it.
Damien15 at 09:45 AM JST - 27th October

Dutch government is working for a change in the law to make it possible to take administrative measures against Dutch ships which commit unlawful acts.

That'll take couple of years. In the mean time, ram away seasheperd, ram them to the ground.!!
davidattokyo at 09:56 AM JST - 27th October

spudman,

only a couple of times

How many chances do you think they get before this sort of behavior does cause more serious damage? And what is the point?

Cool heads should prevail and

How can you dismiss SSCS ramming other vessels they way they did and then talk about cool heads prevailing?

Damien15,

ram away seasheperd, ram them to the ground.!!

You aren't worried about them killing themselves or someone else in the process?
spudman at 11:34 AM JST - 27th October

Would love to see where Sea Shepherd has rammed the whalers.
Damien15 at 11:41 AM JST - 27th October

Would love to see where Sea Shepherd has rammed the whalers.

So very much!! Very happy to see that someone has the resource and balls to fight with these savages. If I had the resources, I'd do the same. No ramming killed anyone yet. Only person died in the whaling ship was due to a fire that seasheperd had nothing to do with. They should sort their safety measures on board before asking Dutch to do something about it.
davidattokyo at 12:07 PM JST - 27th October

Anti-whaler logic: 1) Japan should do something to prevent deaths occurring on their boats (e.g. due to the electrical fault that happened two years back) 2) Japan should do nothing to prevent deaths that are waiting to happen

spudman, you missed it?

E.g.: http://www.icrwhale.org/gpandsea-img139.htm
Disillusioned at 12:15 PM JST - 27th October

there are differences of opinion between Japan and the Netherlands with regard to whaling,

I thought it was 'research' not whaling!
desmosedici at 12:16 PM JST - 27th October

Ah, well, he said something "strongly" and that's what counts. Petty it wasn't Gates to set him straight. There was an odd moment though, when Yukio introduced himself as "my name is Hatoyama, it means pigeon mountain" and Balkenende replying "you smoked my gift already?"
smithinjapan at 12:42 PM JST - 27th October

davidattokyo: Quite the selective editing you're doing, my friend. You spudman on saying the SS has only rammed whalers a couple of times, dismiss the fact that whalers have steered into them as well (hence causing them to ram), and then say his 'cooler heads prevail', which was in relation to BOTH PARTIES ramming, doesn't make sense.

Well, of COURSE something doesn't make sense when you choose only to look at one half of what a person is saying and skew it to your own means.

Quick question: if Japan is falling back on the 'tradition' argument after their scientific hullabaloo falls through, why do they do it so far from home on the huge whaling ships? Were they doing that the 'hundreds of years' they claim they've been whaling?
davidattokyo at 01:05 PM JST - 27th October

smithinjapan,

I think anyone who doesn't accept that SSCS is entirely responsible for all of the collisions between these vessels is pretty gullible.

SSCS is only there because the whaling vessels are there.

Quick question: if Japan is falling back on the 'tradition' argument after their scientific hullabaloo falls through, why do they do it so far from home on the huge whaling ships?

For the same reason that various whaling nations have gone to the Antarctic waters to catch whales (and for the same reason that Yankee and Australia whalers went to the "Japan grounds" to catch whales): Because new technology made it possible, and they wanted to.
usaexpat at 12:04 AM JST - 28th October

I guess if they want to carry on their eco-terrorism they'll have to register the Steve Irwin in Australia. Seems more Aussies are sympathetic to Sea Shepherd but I could be wrong.
ca1ic0cat at 01:40 AM JST - 28th October

I'm not sure I have any idea what that amounts to in practice. I'm sure the Japanese think it means that Sea Shepherd will stop violating COLREGS. I'm sure that the Dutch mean that Sea Shepherd won't set out to kill people. There's a lot of ground in the middle to argue over.

Macht nichts.