The moratorium on commercial whaling, one of the environmental movement's greatest achievements, looks likely to be swept away this summer by a new international deal being negotiated behind closed doors.
The new arrangement would legitimise the whaling activities of the three countries which have continued to hunt whales in defiance of the ban – Japan, Norway and Iceland – and would allow commercial whaling in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary set up by the International Whaling Commission (IWC) in 1994.
Conservationists regard it as catastrophic, but fear there is a very real chance of its being accepted at the next IWC meeting in Morocco in June, not least because it is being strongly supported by the US – previously one of whaling's most determined opponents.



Concerns over a small brush fire that reignited days later into the mammoth Palisades fire –...
The US Senate rejected an effort on Wednesday to halt a contentious US Fish and Wildlife...
A powerful storm doused California with heavy rain on Friday, prompting evacuation warnings as the state...
As Hurricane Melissa crept closer to Jamaica on Monday, Oct. 27, the island nation braced for...





























