Publication: Daily Nation
Paper Date: Wed, May 31, 1995
Paper Page: 18A
Category: News
Byline: Tony Best / North American Editor

Dublin - Four Caricom nations attending the International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting in Ireland are moving to prevent that body from regulating some types of fishing in the Caribbean.

Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and Dominica plan to introduce a resolution to block the IWC from setting rules and regulations that would restrict the catching of small cetaceans. Antigua, also attending the meeting which opened yesterday, is not expected to support the resolution.

"We are studying the matter," was all that John Fuller, Antigua's Commissioner, would say.

St. Lucia's IWC representative, Dr. Edsel Edmunds, who is also ambassador to the US, said: "We fear that some of the nations that are opposed to any sustainable use of whales will try to bring small cetaceans under the aegis of the Commission, and should that happen it would affect the fishery industry of every Caribbean nation. We are considering introducing a resolution to prevent those countries from getting their way."

By small cetaceans, the four Caribbean countries are referring to such species as black fish and dolphins, which are widely caught and eaten in the
region. But even before the resolution was introduced, environmental groups were condemning it.

The head of the International Wildlife Coalition, Dan Morast, who spearheaded last year's largely unsuccessful tourism boycott against the four countries, accused them of acting behind the scenes for Japan. Japan is expected to support the Caricom states' bid to keep small cetaceans
out of the clutches of the IWC.

"We must do something to protect the small cetaceans and the Caribbean countries are acting for the Japanese in this matter," Morast told the Daily Nation.

But Frank Baron, Dominica's IWC Commissioner, dismissed those charges, saying that catching small cetaceans was a tradition in the Caribbean
and must continue "to help people in the region feed themselves and earn a living".

"Black fish and dolphins, not porpoises, are a source of employment and food in the Caribbean and aren't the business of the IWC," he said. "We would fight any attempt to bring small cetaceans under the wings of the Commission," said Baron, who is Dominica's Ambassador to the United Nations.

Opening the meeting yesterday, Ireland's Minister for Arts and Culture, Michael Higgins, reiterated his country's opposition to "the resumption of
commercial whaling unless we are satisfied with the Revised Management Procedure and, in particular the procedure for calculating quotas" for the catching of certain species of whales.

Higgins also warned the IWC and opponents of whaling against trying to impose their will on countries where whaling was part of their cultural heritage.

"It would be wrong and in the nature of cultural imperialism for Ireland to attempt to impose our cultural values on those nations whose populations have depended on the whale for generations," he said. "Yet we will seek to convince them of our position."

After the official opening, both Baron and Senator Denis Noel, a cabinet minister from Grenada, said that Higgins position was close to their countries'.

"We have been saying so all along," said Baron.

This year's conference opened against a background of demonstrations by hundreds of environmentalists outside of Dublin Castle, venue of the talks, calling for  an end to "bloody whaling." The protests were organised by Greenpeace. The Dominica Conservation Association and the Friends of the Earth of Grenada are among the scores of non-government organisations attending the meeting along with representatives from 35 countries.