For the last three years, the Department of Interior has been dragging its feet when it comes to protecting the polar bear. Today, it finally listed the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. This might seem like a victory but there are enough holes in this listing to leave the polar bear unprotected against its biggest threat, global warming.
Stake outs, testimony from informers, hidden cameras and tailing trucks full of stolen goods - it reads like a Hollywood movie, but it was an every day experience for Greenpeace activists in Japan, who have spent four months cracking open a major conspiracy of corruption at the heart of Japan's government-backed, sham scientific whaling operation.
Activists caught an illegal tuna purse seiner (Queen Evelyn 168) in the Pacific Commons yesterday. This Philippines-flagged vessel was close to the transfer of tuna between her sister vessel and a refrigerated mothership. It was likely that the transfer of fish at sea, involving this illegal vessel, was about to occur. But upon our arrival the vessels immediately separated and fled the scene.