Whaling scandal
Greenpeace Japan delivering stolen whale meat to the Tokyo Public Prosecutor's Office
Following last week's revelation that crew members from the fleet responsible for Japan's so-called 'scientific' whaling programme had for many years been stealing and illegally selling off prime whale bacon at the end of each annual hunt.

Last week more than 40,000 Greenpeace supporters wrote to the Japanese government to demand an investigation. Yesterday the Tokyo district Public Prosecutor has confirmed that there will be one.

Greenpeace will be cooperating in every way possible to ensure that it is a full investigation, to the highest levels and not simply the scapegoating of a few individual crew members.

Greenpeace Japan spent four months cracking open what appears to be a major conspiracy of corruption at the heart of Japan's government-backed, sham scientific whaling operation. An informer associated with whale hunting company Kyodo Senpaku told us that not only their employees were involved - officials from the Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR) - the agency that carries out the so-called "scientific research" work on board the whaler's factory ship Nisshin Maru - were almost certainly aware of the thefts as well.

While the investigation is underway, we all need to push the Japanese government now to shut down whaling and cut off its tax subsidies (which currently amount to around £2.4 million every year). We also want to ensure that they investigate this scandal at the highest level - not just by scapegoating crew members.

Please send a message to the Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Japan!