Australia to monitor whaling

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ANBERRA, Australia (AP) _ Australia will send planes and a ship to conduct surveillance of Japanese whaling ships off Antarctica in a bid to build a potential legal case against whaling for scientific research, the government said Wednesday.

The planes and ship would collect photographic and video evidence that would be used to decide if Australia will launch legal action to try to stop Japan's whaling program, Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said.

Smith also said Australia will lead a group of anti-whaling nations in lodging a formal protest with the Japanese government in the next few days against Japan's plans to harvest more than 1,000 whales, including 50 humpbacks, in its largest-ever scientific whale hunt.

"We are dealing here with the slaughter of whales, not scientific research," Smith told a news conference. "That is our start point and our end point."

An Airbus A-319 used by the Australian government's scientific division in Antarctica will conduct surveillance flights over the Japanese fleet, which is due in its target area soon.

Australia will also send a ship operated by its Customs service to the area to collect any evidence that could be used in international legal action against Japan.

Smith said that the ship would be stripped of its .50-caliber machine guns before it is deployed, emphasizing that its role would be purely for surveillance.

He said Australia was taking advice on whether it could launch legal action against Japanese whaling in a range of international forums, including the International Court of Justice, the International Whaling Commission and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

Each year, Japan defies a ban on killing whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary - a massive feeding ground in the Antarctic Ocean that the International Whaling Commission has declared off-limits for commercial whaling - saying its program is exempt because it is for scientific purposes.

Critics call the Japanese program a sham, noting the meat turns up for sale for human consumption.

Smith said the Customs ship, the Oceanic Viking, would likely depart Australia within days.

He said he did not expect the tough new stance on whaling to create diplomatic problems between Japan and the new government of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who was elected in November. Japan and Australia would continue to have good relations despite "strong feelings on both sides" on the whaling issue, he said.

Smith declined to identify the other nations involved in the official protest, saying it was up to them to identify themselves.

An official at the Japanese Embassy in Canberra said there would be no public statement Wednesday.

A Japanese official in Tokyo echoed Smith's statement on keeping good relations.

"We will ... deal with the problem calmly and try not to damage the friendly ties between Japan and Australia," said Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura according to the Kyodo news agency.

But Japan said its research whaling is permitted under International Whaling Commission rules and the whalers will go ahead with their plans.

"Australia is free to do whatever it wants, send planes or a ship," said Ryotaro Suzuki, director of the fisheries division at Japan's Foreign Ministry.

"We have no immediate plans to lodge a protest against the Australian action, as long as they don't use force to stop the Japanese whaling fleet," he said.

Australia's announcement was an improvement on earlier threats to send military planes and warships, Suzuki added.

An independent panel of Australia's leading international law experts concluded in May that the Australian government could take legal action to stop Japan's whaling.

The so-called Sydney Legal Panel concluded that Japan's rapidly expanding scientific whaling program breached the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, the Antarctic Treaty System, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species and the International Convention on the Regulation of Whaling.

Smith also said the new government would drop the previous government's objection to a suit by the animal rights group Humane Society International' in the Federal Court against Japanese whaling company Kyodo Senpaku.

The previous government had argued that the litigation over slaughtered whales was contrary to Australia's interests. The Japanese have said they will ignore any adverse court ruling.

Australia's announcement came as anti-whaling protesters pledging to put themselves between Japanese harpoon guns and their whale prey left New Zealand to confront the whalers.

The Greenpeace ship Esperanza left the port of Auckland for Antarctic waters determined to find the Japanese fleet and "protect the whales, not attack the whalers," the group's Southern Oceans whale campaigner Karli Thomas said.

The U.S.-based Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has sailed to the Antarctic Ocean, vowing to use whatever means necessary to block Japan from harvesting whales.

"We'll be taking nonviolent direct action to stop their hunt ... putting ourselves, our inflatable boats, in between the harpoonists and the whales to stop them getting a clear shot," Thomas told The Associated Press.

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