Japan joined an international moratorium on commercial whaling in 1982, but continued with «scientific» whaling programs that it claimed were exempt from the agreement. (sciencemag.org)
There has been an international moratorium on commercial whaling since 1985, but Japan relies on a clause that allows whales to be taken for research to catch hundreds of minke and smaller numbers of other species each year. (sciencemag.org)
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) released a controversial proposal on 22 April which would allow limited hunting in the hope of achieving an enforceable, consensus agreement that would include Japan, Iceland and Norway, which have caught more than 33,000 whales since the 1986 IWC moratorium on commercial whaling. (scientificamerican.com)