15
May 2008 Tokyo, Japan — Stake outs, testimony
from informers, hidden cameras and tailing
trucks full of stolen goods - it reads like
a Hollywood movie, but it was an every day
experience for Greenpeace activists in Japan,
who have spent four months cracking open
a major conspiracy of corruption at the
heart of Japan's government-backed, sham
scientific whaling operation.
Today we displayed a
cardboard box filled with the best cuts
of whale meat, smuggled ashore by the crew
of the Japanese whaling factory ship, Nisshin
Maru, for illegal trade and personal gain,
at the Japanese taxpayer's expense. The
box, along with videotaped testimony and
other evidence, suggest widespread embezzlement
of whale meat has been occuring for decades
under the noses of the public officials
who run the whaling programme, and are allowing
it to happen.
Bureaucrats ignore theft
from taxpayers
Our activists delivered
the evidence, including the whale meat,
to the Public Prosecutor's office in Tokyo,
calling on it to make a full public enquiry
into how deep the corruption runs with the
whaling programme. We're also calling for
an end to the USD$4.7 million taxpayer subsidies
for the programme, and for the license of
the company operating the whale hunt, Kyodo
Senpaku, to be withdrawn.
The four-month Greenpeace
investigation employed undercover tactics
to reveal dramatic evidence of an embezzlement
ring involving crewmembers on board the
Nisshin Maru. Informers who spoke to the
activists claim that senior crew and officials
from Kyodo Senpaku turned a blind eye to
the whale meat theft, allowing it to continue
for decades. One informer associated with
Kyodo Senpaku told Greenpeace that officials
from the Institute of Cetacean Research
(ICR) - the agency that carries out the
so-called "scientific research"
work on board the Nisshin Maru - are most
likely aware of the thefts as well.
"The information
we have gathered indicates that the scale
of the scandal is so great, it would be
impossible for the ship's operating company,
Kyodo Senpaku, not to know," said Junichi
Sato, Greenpeace Japan whales campaign coordinator.
"Kyodo Senpaku is turning their back
on large scale corruption and theft of taxpayers'
money. What we need to know now, through
a full public enquiry, is who else is profiting
from the whaling programme? Who else has
allowed this fraud to continue?" Sato
added.
Working from information
given by former and current Kyodo Senpaku
employees, the Greenpeace investigators
secretly documented the offloading of smuggled
whale meat into a special truck, while Kyodo
Senpaku officials and crew members stood
by, following the Nisshin Maru's return
earlier this year, on April 15th. Greenpeace
then tracked the consignment from the ship
to a depot in Tokyo.
Consignment sheet detailing,
in Japanese, the contents of a crewmembers'
personal box offloaded from the whaling
factory ship Nisshin Maru, containing 23.5
kilograms of stolen whale meat. The sheet
lists the contents of the box as "cardboard."
The house that stolen
whale meat built
One of four boxes destined
for the same private address was then intercepted,
to verify the contents and establish the
fraud. The consignment notes claimed the
box contained "cardboard" - but
in reality held 23.5kg of salted 'prime'
whale meat, worth up to US$3,000, hidden
beneath overalls. One informer told Greeneace
that dozens of crew take as many as 20 of
these boxes each, and said he overheard
one crewmember claim to have built a house
from the proceeds in stolen whale bacon
alone.
To track down the final
destination of this meat, activists visited
pubs and restaurants in a number of different
locations around Japan where they requested
"special" meat and filmed the
responses using hidden cameras. Traders
and restaurant owners confirmed that they
were expecting the imminent delivery of
whale meat from this year's hunt, despite
the fact that the Japanese Fisheries Agency
and the Institute of Cetacean Research do
not release the whale meat for sale before
the end of June, 2008.
The ongoing Japanese
government-backed scientific whaling programme,
which takes place in the internationally-recognised
Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, has been
continually mired in controversy, lies and
scandal, bringing Japan into international
disrepute. This latest scandal begs the
question of just who profits from a whaling
programme which generates no useful science,
and is commercially unsustainable.
Scandals high and low:
how high does this one go?
While the scandal of
stolen whalemeat is the most shocking, it's
not the only revelation to come from this
investigation. Further allegations from
our informants that require investigation
include:
Throwing tonnes of whale
meat overboard daily because they did not
have processing capacity for the increased
quotas
Cancerous tumours being found and cut out
of whales and the remaining meat processed
for public sale
Targeted hunts to ensure maximum catch,
not random "sampling" as required
by the research permits
Harsh working conditions because of the
increased workload from the increased quotas
Download the full dossier
With Japanese society already bristling
from a litany of public scandals involving
recycling, food labelling, pensions, bid-rigging
for public works and bribes for defence
contracts, the whaling industry now joins
the ranks of the dishonoured, as well as
earning the scepticism of an increasingly
dubious business community, with business
magazine Shukan Toyo Keizai suggesting that
"the stance of whaling hardliners could
also be a vent for narrow-minded nationalism".
Earlier this year, the
Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported that the
whalers were struggling to pay back $1 billion
Yen in borrowed public funds. With a massive
4,000 tonne stockpile of unconsumed whalemeat
and Asahi Shimbun reports of consumer disinterest
in "bloody drippings", the whalers
seem to be onto a sure loser. To make matters
worse, the annual increase in targeted Southern
Ocean whales means that supply is already
outstripping demand, a situation "unthinkable
for an ordinary business entity" according
to the accountant of a major audit corporation
quoted by the Asahi Shimbun.
"The whaling
programme in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary
is funded by the Japanese taxpayers and
they have a right to know who is profiting
from their money," commented Sato.
"The Japanese whaling programme has
already been shamed internationally for
its lack of scientific credibility, embarrassed
by the generation of vast stockpile of whale
meat few want to eat and is now embroiled
in a scandal at home for being corrupt.
It is time for the whaling programme to
be stopped and public money spent on something
more honourable." Sato concluded.
