Whale Defenders

Overexploit, cheat, and deplete. The cycle of greed behind the global whaling industry drove one whale population after another toward oblivion. It is still not known if some species will ever recover, even after decades of protection.

The statistics say it all. The blue whales of the Antarctic are at less than 2 percent of their original abundance, despite 40 years of complete protection. Some populations of whales are recovering but some are not.

Only one population, the East Pacific gray whale, is thought to have recovered to its original abundance, but the closely related West Pacific gray whale population is the most endangered in the world. It hovers on the edge of extinction with just over 100 remaining. 

Save the Whales

Sign our petition supporting the Obama Administration’s strong position on whale conservation. The United States has a long history of advocating for whale conservation. The Obama Administration must continue the charge, until the whales are saved.

It’s important for the President to know that YOU support whale conservation. His Administrations’ strong stance will be even stronger with your support.

The whales can’t speak for themselves, so we must speak for them. Whale hunting for commercial purposes must be stopped and calm returned to the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.

Sign the Petition

 

Antigua: Be a whale friendly nation

The fate of the world’s whales is in the hands of the International Whaling Commission. Each year, 70 countries that make up the IWC vote on the conditions of the worldwide whaling moratorium. Year after year, Japan lobbies to persuade other countries to vote against the moratorium, trying to reestablish commercial whaling.

This heavy-handed lobbying has bought the votes of many Caribbean countries. But, thanks to public pressure and the fear of lost tourism revenue, many island nations are siding with the whales and not the whalers. In 2009, the Commonwealth of Dominica announced they would be a whale conservation nation and now the islands of Antigua and Barbuda are on the cusp of making the same decision.

Please take action and encourage the Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda to do the right thing and vote for the whales and not against them.

Take action today

 

Tokyo Two

 

Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki, known as the “Tokyo Two,” are due to stand trial on February 15th - charged for theft and trespass. But over the past two years it has become clear that much more is now under the legal spotlight. Corrupt government practices, censoring public information, Japan’s adherence to international law, freedom of speech and the right of individual protest together with the commercial killing of thousands of whales are all under the spotlight. And before the verdict has even been rendered, a working group of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has already ruled that, in the defendants' attempts to expose a scandal in the public interest, their human rights have been breached by the Japanese justice system.

Following a Greenpeace undercover investigation in May 2008 that exposed the embezzlement of whale meat from the taxpayer-funded whaling fleet, Japanese authorities responded with a politically motivated prosecution, arresting Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki and raiding the Greenpeace Japan office in June 2008.

Junichi and Toru were charged with theft and trespass after they exposed a major scandal around the embezzlement and black market sales of whale meat from the Japanese government-sponsored Southern Ocean whaling program.

Our office in Japan is under attack and our activists are being prosecuted as a warning to citizens who bring the Japanese government’s whaling program into question. But we are not giving up. The only way we can stop whales being harpooned in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary is to bring down the whaling industry in Japan. We have it on its knees and with enough support we can finish it - forever.

Show your solidarity with Junichi and Toru — and tell the government of Japan that protecting the whales shouldn't be a crime. 

Sign the petition