Australian Whales envoy named? Rumours abound
According to the The Age newspaper in Australia, diplomat Sandy Hollway has been unofficially named as Australia's new "whale envoy" to Japan:
"[Prime Minister] Kevin Rudd has selected Labor mate Sandy Hollway to be Australia's first whaling envoy, ending a desperate five-month search for someone willing to confront Japan over its whale slaughter. An experienced diplomat and chief of staff to former prime minister Bob Hawke, Mr Hollway is known to most Australians as the face of the 2000 Sydney Olympics where he was head of the organising committee. He is also on good terms with Mr Rudd, appointed by the Prime Minister in March as chief mediator between Canberra and Port Moresby over the future of the Kokoda Trail."
The Age: Diplomat lands task of stopping whale hunt »
If these reports of Mr. Hollway's appointment as Australia's Whales Envoy to Japan are true, then the Australian government should confirm it as soon as possible - rather than leave it open to further speculation. Support for whaling is on the wane in Japan, but Hollway - or whoever gets the envoy role - will still have his work cut out for him, what with the International Whaling Commission Meeting coming up in June, and the Japanese whaling fleet gearing up for a return to the Southern Ocean at the end of the year.
Comments
"Support for whaling is on the wane in Japan"
Really?
Do you have any evidence of that...apart from the survey you made (and which is certainly biased by the way the questions were set)?
The Asahi Shimbun poll actuall shows that a majority of Japanese supports both eating whale and scientific whaling.
Anyway, whoever Australia sends to Japan as a whaling envoy won't change much as both countries have agreed to disagree. So there's no room for negociation. Australia is irrelevent on this issue and Japan will seek dialogue with other nations.
Posted by: isanatori | May 9, 2008 11:05 AM
Yep, really!
For a start, yes, the poll done by the Nippon Research Centre shows a decline in support for whaling.
You just have to examine the figures. It costs ¥5 billion (around US$ 50 million) to run the Southern Ocean whaling programme. ¥1 billion of that comes from the taxpayer - and the whalers defaulted on a repayment of a ¥1 loan of public funds earlier this year. The rest of it apparently comes from whale meat sales. That's USD $40 million. In a population of 127 million people, that means that the whalers are making making about $1 from one in three people, per year.
I think you'll find that Australia's anything but irrelevent on the issue. Let's see what happens at th e G8 meeting in Australia.
For your amusement: Broken hearts for Hu Jintao of China, Fukuda of Japan, John Howard, Prince Charles and Robert Mugabe
Posted by: Dave not on the Esperanza | May 9, 2008 11:25 AM
Oh, and I meant to mention. This morning, NHK reported that at the G8 foreign minister's meeting in June, Australia, US and Japan will sit down for a private meeting - ostensibly to discuss defence issues, but the elephant in the room will be a whale, so to speak.
Posted by: Dave not on the Esperanza | May 9, 2008 11:58 AM