This year's meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) took place in Oman, May 16-21. The United States resumed its traditional role as the leading country urging protection of whales.
The most significant action of this year's meeting was the decision to spend 100,000 British Pounds ($166,000 US) on studies of environmental threats to cetaceans. The strong support of US Whaling Commissioner, Dr. James Baker, Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Dr. Michael Tillman of the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), was instrumental in obtaining this important first-time funding by the Commission. The excellent report prepared by the Environmental Investigation Agency's Alexander von Bismarck laid the thorough scientific groundwork which made this important IWC action possible.
IWC Chairman
Michael Canny, of Ireland, has been pressing a dangerous
compromise which would leave approximately 40% of the ocean available
to commercial whalers, making only deep-water pelagic whaling
illegal. Japan strongly urged that the vote on "'The Irish
Proposal"' be taken by secret ballot, but the Commissioners
refused to agree, and the Canny proposal was dropped for this
year but is expected to be proposed again at the next IWC meeting.
Environmental threats include not only widespread toxic pollution, which has long been recognized, but noise pollution including the sonic bombardment conducted in March 1998 by researchers for the US Navy. Courageous action, carried out by Ben White, AWI's International Coordinator, brought an end to the Low-Frequency Active sonar (LFA) transmissions which blasted the humpback whales and their newborn babies with up to 155 decibels of intense noise. Navy researchers stopped their sound bombardment of whales whenever human beings got into the water between their ship and the whales, as Ben and his cohorts did.
A decision has since been made by the Navy not to attempt any further tests in Hawaii on the humpback whales. However, it appears that these tests, which are inspired by the existence of noiseless submarines, are being conducted by other countries and by NATO. Dr. A. Frantzis of the University of Athens, reported the beaching of a number of Cuvier's beaked whales, which occurred after NATO LFA tests. His report was published in Nature, the international scientific journal. In reaction to the Frantzis report, the NATO Navies held a special emergency meeting in Italy in June to address the problem and to develop a policy to limit the use of this technology in areas where whales and dolphins could be impacted. In addition to tests by defense agencies, oil drilling creates noise of such intensity that it can physically deafen whales in the vicinity.
Dr. Linda Weilgart, a world authority on whales, testified vigorously against LFA sonar transmissions. In addition to her protest on behalf of the whales, she raised economic questions as well, pointing out the damage to the whale watching industry from such emissions. Several lawsuits are still pending against the Navy's actions.
Still another publication to help
better the lives of animals in laboratories was published by AWI,
Environmental Enhancement for Caged Rhesus Macaques. Dr.
Viktor Reinhardt and David Seelig are responsible for this fascinating
publication which first appeared on the World Wide Web and is
now available in print. This amplifies for monkeys last year's
new publication, Comfortable Quarters for Laboratory Animals
(8th edition). It was reviewed in Animal 
Welfare,
the University Federation
for Animal Welfare's international journal. The reviewer, Dr.
Paul Townsend, recommended that it be studied by ""all
animal care committees as a reference point for their review of
their institutional accommodation and husbandry procedures."
For many years, AWI's series of editions of Comfortable Quarters,
with its recommendations for more space and opportunity for
exercise, were disparaged and disregarded by proponents of the
standard small cages. These substandard housing cubicles are produced
in multitudes and used as a matter of course by followers of the
scientific establishment. The new edition has been sent out to
every registered research facility in the United States, along
with a leaflet offering a free copy of Environmental Enhancement
for Caged Rhesus Macaques. A select list of primatologists
throughout the world received free copies of this publication.
AWI's The Animal Dealers: Evidence
of Abuse of Animals in the Commercial Trade, 1952-1997 was offered, free of charge for
a single copy, to chiefs of police and sheriffs, scientific institutions,
public libraries and animal protective societies throughout the
United States. AWI has been working to stop animal dealer cruelty
since 1952. This book is important for heads of scientific institutions
because of its informative and very substantial sections on Class
B or random source dealers in dogs and cats. These dealers have
been found to trade in animals obtained by fraud or outright theft,
and they all too frequently neglect and mistreat the animals from
which they profit by charging high prices to scientific institutions.
The chapters on dog and cat dealers were written by attorney Mary
Ellen Drayer. Experts on primates, birds and reptiles wrote the
chapters on these other victims of trade. The demand was so great
when the offerings of single free copies were issued that AWI's
fax machine succumbed and a new fax had to be installed. Copies
of the book have also been provided to US Department of Agriculture
Inspectors who try to prevent dealer abuses. Due to their efforts,
the number of Class B
dealers has been reduced to 41. Cases are pending against four
of these dealers for violations of the federal Animal Welfare
Act. A bill to end supply of dogs and cats to laboratories by
Class B random-source dealers is pending, with no action scheduled
in the US Congress.
Cathy Liss, AWI's Executive Director, was invited to speak against
the use of random source dog and cat dealers at the November 16,
1997 annual meeting of the American Association for Laboratory
Animal Science (AALAS), the largest gathering of laboratory animal
caretakers, veterinarians and researchers. Ironically, at this
same meeting AWI was refused permission to rent an exhibit booth
to hand out free books and other humane literature.
A few years ago AALAS adopted a policy to restrict the groups which exhibited at their meetings, requiring all exhibitors to sign a pledge of allegiance to their views on the use of animals for experimental purposes. Because AWI sets a higher standard for laboratory animal care, we were unable to sign the document. The Board of AALAS refused to grant AWI a waiver which left us with two new books which we expected to be of great interest to conference attendees, but no exhibit.
Determined not to let the lack of a booth stand in her way, Cathy took 16 cartons of the books to the California meeting. An exhibitor sympathetic to her plight loaned Cathy his hand truck which she loaded with cases of books, handing them out as she went from one scientific session to another -- until an AALAS executive prohibited this activity too.
Not to be deterred, Cathy wheeled the hand truck outside, crossed the street, and continued to offer the books to people entering and leaving the convention center. The people attending the conference were pleased to receive the books, and word spread so that others knew to find AWI's "exhibit" outside. Stopping only to go inside to give her presentation, Cathy continued handing out books until every last one was gone. The controversy unwittingly focused attention on these important publications and on AWI's humane aims.
By coercing the European Union (EU) into signing an appallingly loophole ridden agreement, the Clinton Administration undermined the valiant efforts of AWI and the many US and European animal protective groups who fought side-by-side to attain a ban on importation of furs from countries that still use the cruel steel jaw leghold trap. The European Union, threatened by a World Trade Organization (WTO) challenge capable of bringing heavy fines on the EU, succumbed after Charlene Barshefsky, US Trade Representative, personally lobbied the German government to change its position.
Carlos Pimenta, Member of the European Parliament and tireless leader in the fight against steel traps, condemned the spurious US/ EU agreement as "'the worst, even weaker" than that with Canada and Russia.
Anita Pollack, another Member of the European Parliament who has strongly supported the leghold trap ban, said: ""We are here debating a very peculiar creature. It is called an agreement yet in reality it is a non-agreement. I would liken it to the Cheshire Cat because all you can see is its smile. First, it should be said that Parliament did not seek this agreement, we want the implementation of the 1991 Regulation. That was very carefully put together to end the worst cruelty associated with the trade which allows rich women to wear the furs of tortured animals."'
The EU Regulation has banned the use of leghold traps throughout its 15 member states, but the major users, the US and Canada, managed to side-step the import ban which was such a significant part of the EU Regulation.
AWI's Executive Director, Cathy Liss, finished her stint on the National Wildlife Services Advisory Committee (formerly Animal Damage Control). She is now moving to the Advisory Board of the Jack Berryman Institute where she will have an opportunity to influence recommendations for predator control without the use of the agonizing steel jaw leghold trap.
Last year the 15 Heads of government of the European Union (EU) agreed to a legally binding protocol that commits the EU and its member states to ""pay full regard to the welfare requirements of animals."" When formulating and implementing community policies on agriculture, transport, research and internal trade, the EU is now formally committed to recognize that animals are living creatures capable of feeling pain and fear. They are fully capable, too, of enjoying themselves when well treated. Their well-being, therefore, is covered under the EU's sentient beings rubric.
This important
protocol was not easily achieved. In 1991, the organization Compassion
in World Farming presented a petition signed by a million people
to the European Parliament. The signatures were gathered from
all the member states. It called for animals to be given a new
status in the Treaty of Rome as sentient beings. At that time,
the Treaty, which forms the cornerstone of EU law, classified
animals as goods or agricultural products. In 1994, the Parliament
endorsed the petition, and in 1995 it called for the Treaty to
be strengthened to make concern for animal welfare one of the
fundamental principles of the EU. The Government of the United
Kingdom led the EU in securing this important victory for sentient
beings. The United States ought to be next to adopt this wise,
humane foundation for the welfare of animals in agriculture, transport,
research and interstate commerce.
Monsanto's "Posilac," the recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH) which the giant transnational corporation has been pressing on dairy farmers, has met stiff resistance by Ben & Jerry's ice cream company. They had to go to court and win the case for honest labeling of their products. All Ben & Jerry's ice cream containers now state: "'The family farmers who supply our milk and cream pledge not to treat their cows with rBGH. This growth hormone makes such terrible demands on the unfortunate cows who are inoculated with it that painful mastitis affecting their udders and painful dislodging of calcium from their bones cause many to collapse and die prematurely.
Throughout the western United States, political battles are being waged against the giant hog factory farms that are using huge financial resources to mislead the public in their effort to proliferate and entrench themselves. Millions of sows are now confined to stalls so narrow that they can barely get up and lie down. The can never turn around . They gnaw their imprisoning bars in a vain effort to escape.
The waste coming from these incarcerated hogs, standing on bare concrete slats, frequently overflows from the "'lagoons" (open septic tanks), polluting rivers and streams, seeping even into the ground water and poisoning the wells used by rural communities. Colorado farmers and ranchers have joined together and formed an organization called STENCH which is pushing for a state-wide ballot initiative to regulate such farms and restrict the number of hogs they can house to 5,000*. Transnational corporations are counting on selling both the live pigs and the pork to China, Korea and other Asian nations.
The 40th meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) Standing Committee was held from March 3-6, 1998 in London, coinciding with the 25th anniversary of this historic wildlife treaty. Thirty-four CITES Parties were present. Although non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are not able to attend these sessions as observers, one evening was reserved for NGO presentations. AWI's Adam Roberts, as Chair of the Species Survival Network (SSN) Bear Working Group, addressed the delegates about the need to act immediately to end the ongoing illegal trade in bear parts and products of use in traditional Asian medicine.
AWI and SSN hoped the Parties would take significant proactive measures to implement the recommendations agreed to in a resolution unanimously passed at the tenth Conference of the Parties to CITES last summer in Harare, Zimbabwe. One of the more important decisions taken at the Harare meeting was to call for the CITES Secretariat "to convene an international workshop on law enforcement and forensic techniques essential to stopping illegal trade in bear parts and derivatives." AWI and SSN have long endorsed such a workshop.
To its credit, the CITES Secretariat took this recommendation one step further by recognizing that the trade in threatened and endangered species for medicinal purposes threatens many species in addition to bears, such as the highly imperiled tiger. The Secretariat advised "that joint approaches to these two species may prove practical, beneficial and cost effective".
The Standing Committee, therefore, agreed to convene this important enforcement and forensics workshop and, at our request, would attempt to do so in Asia by the end of 1998. It is AWI's hope that holding the workshop in Asia would ensure widespread participation by CITES officials in the Asian region where demand for parts and products of endangered species is greatest. It would also provide an advanced opportunity for public education and awareness through the media attention that such a workshop would receive.
AWI and SSN have made significant advancements in fostering a cooperative and productive relationship with the CITES Secretariat and Parties to the Convention. Hopefully this professional connection will advance our efforts to protect bears, tigers and other species in trade for years to come.