Posted on 01/15/2008 7:43:41 PM PST by Stoat
This is the moment a British anti-whaling activist was taken captive on a Japanese harpoon ship.
Giles Lane appears to be crying out in pain as the sailors surround him and bind him.
In the dramatic pictures his companion, an Australian, is wrapped around with rope and seems powerless to help.
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Captured: Giles Lane, left, appears to cry out while his Australian companion (right) looks on
Colleagues of the pair in the Sea Shepherd marine protection organisation claim they were later tied to the radar mast in the freezing cold as the vessel sped from the area in the Antarctic.
"They have assaulted and kidnapped two of my crew," said Captain Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd vessel Steve Irwin.
The Japanese Whaling Association last night denied the men had been tied to the mast, but admitted they were being held on board the Yushin Maru.
A spokesman claimed that Mr Lane, 36, from Cuckfield, in West Sussex, and Australian Benjamin Potts had boarded the ship illegally and intended to entangle the vessel's propellers with rope and throw bottles of acid on the decks.
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Sea spray: The Yushin Maru crew turn a high pressure hose on the men as they approach
The sensational confrontation came hours after an Australian court banned Japan from whaling in its Antarctic waters.
The ruling applies to a sanctuary declared by Australia in 2000 - which Japan does not recognise.
Some of its ships are already in the area for a planned cull of 1,000 fin and minke whales for "scientific research".
When crew members on board the Steve Irwin learned of the judgment they clapped and cheered, then tried to send a radio message to a fleet they had been shadowing for three days.
The Japanese failed to respond, so Captain Watson decided to send Mr Lane and Mr Potts to one of the ships, the Yushin Maru, to deliver a letter outlining the judgment and demanding that the whaling stop immediately.
First the sailors turned high-pressure hoses on them. And Captain Watson said that as soon as the two men boarded the ship by clambering up a ladder the Japanese set upon them.
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Illegal: Japanese whalers have been banned from hunting in Australian waters by a court judgment
"First of all they tried to throw Benjamin Potts overboard, but he managed to get his way out of that," he said.
"Then they assaulted Giles Lane. He seems to be in some pain.
"They tied him up with an incredible number of ropes. It looks like some kind of bondage movie. It's ridiculous."
There are concerns now for the safety of the two men in the freezing conditions.
In Tokyo last night, Makoto Ito, spokesman for the Japanese Whaling Association denied they had been tied to a mast.
"It is illegal to board another country's vessels on the high seas. As a result, at this stage, they are being held in custody while decisions are made on their future," he said.
"This is just propaganda by Sea Shepherd," he added. "I believe the two men are on the boat but we cannot give further details at this time.
"Sea Shepherd has been harassing our research vessels, but no one is bound to the mast of the Yushin Maru."
There are also concerns that more serious confrontations will occur in coming days when an Australian government vessel arrives in the area.
The converted cruise liner has a number of weapons on board - and environmentalists believe it will try to drive the Japanese out.
That would be a really useful skill to have ...
"Help! Help! I'm being repressed!"
that crybaby shoes you have truly neurrotic these animal rights types are.
so effed up enternally that they have to project that psychocrap on the rest of us and they fixate on the poor animals of the wordl because they can’t stand themselves and hence the rest of mankind by extension.
like someone said....liberalism is a mental disorder...and animal rights maniacs are some of the worst
at least the other guys has the “hey we got caught bro” look
They are terrorists groups.
They get a pass because of their ‘for the animals’ stuff.
wonder what those Japs woulda done to these clowns in early ‘42
I don’t buy arguments that the Japanese are in the right because Australia’s claim to these waters is in dispute, since Japan has also shown complete contempt for the Southern Ocean Sanctuary declared by the International Whaling Commission (different from the location over which Australia has unilaterally claimed jurisdiction), of which Japan is a member. When that sanctuary was established in 1994, Japan was the ONLY one of the 24 countries voting that opposed it. Commercial whaling is banned by the IWC in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary, so Japan just goes ahead and conducts massive hunts and claims they aren’t commercial, but rather “scientific research”. If you’re going to run around breaking laws established by an authority you claim to recognize, you have no moral standing to object to others doing the same.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Ocean_Whale_Sanctuary
Outside the political limits of any sovereignty, actions and force rule, because, thank God, there is no world government to bestow "rights".
Amongst sovereign nations, you duke it out, one wins and thereby "has the right", which is human, proper and will always work to keep the human race strong and fit to deal with uncompromising and unsympathetic reality.
You sound just like a bleeding heart, hoss.
Thanks for forcing me to learn more about this.
It seems that Japan is correct in ignoring Australia’s “law” concerning extending their border to the Antarctic.
Second, after reading the IWC website, these guys are a farce. Sure they started out to be an “inclusive” organization to protect the world’s whaling population from overharvesting, but reading their own website shows that they have turned into an arm of Greenpeace. No wonder the Japanese ignore them now.
Did you know that there has been a complete moratorium on whaling since 1982? None, zero, zip, nada whales OTHER THAN BY NATIVE PEOPLES can hunt whales. Reading the meeting highlights these jokers get together year after year after year to debate lifting the moratorium but it never happens. Instead new research groups are formed to look into it. Monaco seems to be their favorite meeting place.
What a joke.
I can only hope these radicals are charged and punished.
If he’s crying now, wait till he sees what he gets for lunch.
What does the guy on the right have in his backpack, I wonder. Seems awfully bulky for just the letter they claimed to be delivering
There’s no crying in whaling!
I don’t know, but it sure doesn’t look big enough to hold enough rope to disable a large whaling ship. Nor do I imagine that pouring a bottle of acid the size of that backpack on the deck of this large ship would do any serious damage.
How does this stack up on the PC scale of “righteousness?”
“Ahhhh, but you’ve HEARD of me!” Captain Jack Sparrow
Don’t hurt Bambi!
So what?
>so Japan just goes ahead and conducts massive hunts and claims they arent commercial, but rather scientific research.
Which, even a cursory reading of the link that you provided will show, in fact, that Japan is within those rules.
Now you clearly don't like that either, and that may be an issue for you, as well, but that is what it is.
And oz courts and even the 9th circus can all rule whatever they please, as well, but it means nothing of consequence unless you are simply trying to get into a pissing contest with Japan.
Whaling to Japan is like Deer and Elk hunting here in the USA, multipled by a factor of 5. Imagine telling American Hunters that Elk in Colorado are endangered and there will be no more hunting,etc, transpose that scenario here, and you will appreciate the complexities involved. That is why the International Commission has made little or no progress with Japan, they don't have the communicative cross cultural expertise to solve the problem.
I believe whales are a finaite resource that need cultivation. The Japanese are experts at cultivating finite resources, it is one of the many reasons their ancient culture has managed to survive for two thousand years. That is what needs to be accessed.
(Tell the whaling commission they can hire me as a consultant, LOL.)
The greenies have indeed met their match, and if they push it further, blood will flow on both sides of this equation, or maybe on three sides if you include the whales.
THe whaling commission thinks it can make progress by just involving the Japanese Government and the Marine Companies in Japan that do the whaling. The demand for whale meet drives the dynamic, which is created by the many high gear commercial fish markets in Japan, that conduct daily auctions for commercial wholesale consumers. Thats where the effort and diplomacy needs to be focused in the Japanese market structure for whale meat and the other products, such as bone, oil, etc. Nothing from a whale goes to waste with the Japanese.
So how do we approach it. Japans unique position in whaling, and its cultural connections to it need to be acknowledged. That of Iceland and other Scandanavian countries does also. They need to be required somehow to manage and cultivate the rsource instead of fighting international consensus, which they can always succeed in, because of a paucity of the military type of enforcement required to preserve the resource.That type of enforcement will never evolve in the whaling industry.Thats a fact that needs to be faced. The expertise of those nations who d still whale needs to be accessed co-operatively and diplomatically.
Ping
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