Japan's pro-whaling vote win on IWC

For those following the anti-whaling debate here (and elsewhere), I thought I'd post a quick follow up: Japan won some votes at the IWC conference in St Kitts and Nevis, including one declaring that the morotorium on whaling was no longer needed. Ouch! A bad day for whales! It made the headlines in Australia, including this ABC News online piece: Japan wins symbolic pro-whaling vote.

However, the whaling lobby also lost some key votes – including their move to introduce secret ballots at the Commission, which was seen as a move to enable Japan's small-nation allies to vote in its favour without being accountable to the rest of the conference.

The ABC News online article has excellent coverage of the IWC outcomes, (including audio-on-demand) so I suggest checking it out.