Fed: Greenpeace welcomes armed cruise ship into whale crusade

AAP General News (Australia)
12-18-2007
Fed: Greenpeace welcomes armed cruise ship into whale crusade

CANBERRA, Dec 18 AAP - Greenpeace has welcomed a report that Australia will use an
armed P&O cruise ship to watch over Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean this summer.

High-level talks have centred around leasing the Oceanic Viking, a commercial vessel
with a reinforced hull to tackle ice, a crew trained for polar conditions and surveillance
equipment, Fairfax reports today, citing anonymous sources.

"We're certainly supporting the Australian government's action that they're taking
in sending a ship down," Greenpeace's Karli Thomas told the Nine Network.

"The more scrutiny that we can have on the Japanese whaling operation the better."

Ms Thomas said Greenpeace's main aim was to disprove Japanese assertions that the hunt
is part of scientific research.

"It's commercial hunting," she said.

While welcoming the reported plan, Ms Thomas said it was not enough.

"This year in particular the Japanese government is starting to feel the heat," she said.

"There's been a very high level of international condemnation of the hunt and they're
only just reaching the Southern Ocean now."

AAP pv/rl/maur/jlw

KEYWORD: WHALING AUST GREENPEACE

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