Political Quotes

“the resolution that Senator Kerry and I are submitting is very timely and important. As we work here in the Senate today, representatives of nations from around the globe are preparing for the 53rd Annual Meeting of the International Whaling Commission to be held in London July 23-27, 2001. At this meeting, the IWC will determine the fate of the world's whales through consideration of proposals to end the current global moratorium on commercial whaling. The adoption of any such proposals by the IWC would mark a major setback in whale conservation. It is imperative that the United States remain firm in its opposition to any proposals to resume commercial whaling and that we, as a nation, continue to speak out passionately against this practice. It is also time to close one of the loopholes used by nations to continue to whale without regard to the moratorium or established whale sanctuaries. The practice of unnecessary lethal scientific whaling is outdated and the value of the data of such research has been called into question by an international array of scientists who study the same population dynamics questions as those who harvest whales in the name of science. This same whale meat is then processed and sold in the marketplace. These sentiments have been echoed by the Scientific Committee of the IWC which has repeatedly passed resolutions calling for the cessation of lethal scientific whaling, particularly that occurring in designated whale sanctuaries.”