World of opinion
On Japanese whaling wars:
Playing chicken with Japanese whalers is a risky way to preserve vulnerable species. Paul Watson’s Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is notorious for harassing whalers with water and noise cannons, rancid butter bombs, and close calls. And the whalers hit back. Last season they sheared off the bow of a protest vessel.
In that fractious light, Japan’s bid to persuade American officials to revoke Sea Shepherd’s tax-exempt charitable status because of its “violent protests” is hard to take. Courtesy of WikiLeaks, we know that Tokyo has been lobbying to dry up the group’s support.
Though Sea Shepherd doesn’t go out of its way to publicize its finances, the U.S.-based Charity Navigator group put its revenue at just under $10 million in 2009. Some 30 per cent comes from the U.S., so a crackdown could hurt. (It does not have charitable status here.)
Yet even as Japan preaches respect for the law, it hardly has clean hands. Despite a 1986 ban on whaling, its fleet took 825 of the 1,867 whales caught last year. Since the ban, 35,000 have been killed. Japan claims a “research” exemption to legitimize a commercial hunt that ends up on dinner tables. Its biggest catch, Antarctic Minke whales, while far from endangered, seem to be in “appreciable decline,” the International Whaling Commission reports.
Rather than complain about Sea Shepherd, scofflaw Tokyo should join most of the world and shelve its rogue hunt.
The Toronto Star
On UN reform:
The debut of Colombia, Germany, India, Portugal and South Africa as non-permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, starting on New Year’s Day, has aroused expectations for the greater representation of emerging economies in the world body and renewed calls for UN reform.
The five newcomers will serve a two-year term on the council, which is believed to be the most representative yet. This means that all the BRIC states, an economic bloc comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China, and the soon-to-be new addition South Africa, are all members of the council. Given their rising economic clout, these countries have given much hope to the world economic recovery.
In their latest joint statement welcoming South Africa to what will be BRICS, these nations vowed to cooperate more on multilateral platforms.
The UNSC will be an ideal place for their future collaboration and will increase the influence of emerging economies in the world’s biggest organization. …
Rational and reasonable UNSC reform is necessary, as it will help improve the authority and efficiency of the council and enable it to carry out more effectively the responsibilities entrusted to it by the UN Charter. …
UNSC reform will not occur overnight, or in a few years, it will require many rounds of thorough consultations and negotiations. Therefore any attempt to set an artificial time limit for UNSC reform is both far-fetched and reckless.
China Daily, Beijing
On ongoing Israeli illegal settlements:
The Palestinians decided to go to the UN Security Council and seek censorship of Israel’s continued settlement activities on territories seized from them. It would not be the first time the Security Council condemns such acts; it has repeatedly done so, calling on Israel to cease and desist from this illegal action.
That the Palestinian side would want a new international condemnation of the Israeli settlements could be prompted, other than by the sheer injustice and illegality of the settlement enterprise, by the United States’ failure to convince Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to halt construction of new settlements on Palestinian lands.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had conditioned consent to resume direct negotiations with Israel on an immediate end of all Israeli settlement activity. Israel’s intransigent position has left all moves on the peace front in limbo, so action has to be taken somewhere, and going to the UN looks like a fitting step.
While the Security Council has yet to cast a vote on the Palestinian request, there is little doubt that the draft resolution will win unanimous support from its members. The problem for the Palestinians, then, is where to go after the adoption of the Palestinian draft resolution is duly adopted.
Israel can be expected to defy the UN once again, unperturbed by the international community’s rejection of its actions. It has been doing that for decades, with impunity, emboldened by the toothless world organization.
More important, and interesting – if only being naive and still believing that the U.S. intends to be an impartial mediator in the Palestinian-Israeli problem – will be to see Washington’s stance after the council’s resolution. …
The Jordan Times, Amman