When Captain Paul Watson - co-founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society returned from exile in France, TUC radio broadcast an interview with him that surpassed in downloads all programs of 2016 except for one. So here is an update on occasion of the beginning of the Japanese whale hunt in the Southern Ocean.
Sea Shepherd is an international non-profit, marine wildlife conservation organization. Their 1977 founding mission is to end the destruction of habitat and the slaughter of wildlife in the world's oceans. Their decades long practice of aggressive non-violence has led to charges of piracy. However Sea Shepherd's legal team defends the organization's right to enforce international conservation laws in neutral waters.
Courts in many jurisdictions have sided with Sea Shepherd - with the notable exception of the US 9th District Court. The US court sided in 2012 with Japanese Whalers and ordered Watson to stay away from the whaling fleet. Even though in March 2014 the International Court of Justice ruled that the Japanese whaling program was not, as claimed, for scientific purposes, and ordered Japan to cease operations, the US District Court is standing by its ruling. On August 23, 2016, a preliminary injunction, which prevents Sea Shepherd's US branch from disrupting Japanese whaling operations in the Southern Ocean, became permanent.
However Sea Shepherd is an international organization and the Australian branch is not bound by the US 9th District Court ruling. Australia in fact has declared Japan's hunt in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary to be illegal.
As this program goes out in late November 2016 Sea Shepherd Australia is outfitting their most recently added vessel, the Ocean Warrior, to confront Japanese whalers who already left Japan on November 18, 2016.
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