| Where Soviets stand on whaling

By BERT WHYTE

MOSCOW — Whales are in no dan-
€t of disappearing from. our planet,
according to officials of the USSR Min-
istry of Fisheries.

Mr. Stepanov, head of the Soviet de-
Partment of international regulation of
fishing, and Mr. Iveryanovich, the chief

Viet expert on whaling, laughed
when I showed them a Canadian news-
pet report which claimed that dras-
Ic action is needed to save the whale
Species from total extinction. -

b It is true,” said Stepanov, “that
Big, Species should be protected, and
; S is being done. At the meeting of
ag International Whaling Commission
4 Benton last year, the introduction

as oO -
mended nm some types was recom
3 Sharing the general opinion of

Clentists on this question, the Soviet
en has voluntarily agreed to set

€r quotas. We have lowered our
ee On finback whales by 30% and
is S€l whales by 20%. The overall de-

fase on all species is 11%.”

_ Atlantic Remnant

Canadian newspapers headlined Ot-
Aes decision to ban the remnant of

T whaling industry in the Atlantic.

os key word is “remnant.” For the

ct is that whaling is no longer pro-
ilar le on Canada’s east coast. A sim-
es Reunion ended whaling operations

tt © west coast in the 1950's.
ana pet be mentioned that the USSR

ene whaling in iE Saati
e past several years has
posed down five whaling stations in

e Far East.

Canadian newspaper concern over
in arose following the Stock-
ae Nited Nations environment con-
oi Ce in 1972, where a 10-year mora-
rag On whaling was proposed. But
ae the International Whaling
abstai Ission parley in London, Canada

‘ ned from voting on the question,
sey Whaling experts reached a dif-

Nt conelusion from that arrived at
Instead Conservationists at Stockholm.
ific ¢ ofa ban on whaling, the scien-
quot Ommission recommended placing

4S on some species.

un Quotas Checked

a an those are the recommendations
Present following,” said Stepanov. “At
in the we have three whaling’ fleets
Pacific Antarctic and two in the North
plug) That means five factory ships
ers peveral dozen small -whale chas-

**N recent years we have removed

fer,

Gadaffi isolates Libyans

hae RIPOLI

— President Gadaffi near the Tunisian border, Ga-

BRITISH COLUMBIA GOV'T PHOTO

A far cry from the whaling industry of today, this dramatic all-carved diorama of
a whale-hunt by the Nootka people of Canada’s west coast, shows a long-gone
practi€e. The powerful carving, the figures slightly larger than life-size from lamin-
ated yellow cedar blocks ‘and the 30’ dugout from‘a single red cedar log, is
displayed in the British Columbia Museum in Victoria. It was carved by Douglas

Crammer and Godfrey Hunt._

two factory ships — one in the Ant-
arctic — and: disengaged 29 whaling
boats.” :

The two greatest whaling nations
today are Japan and the Soviet Union.
As the preceding paragraph indicates,
they do not have (in the purple prose
of Canadian newspapers) “scores of
whaling factory ships and hundreds of
whale chasers in operation.”

“How do you ensure that quotas are
respected?” I asked Stepanov.

“Very simple,” he replied. ““We have
observers aboard the Japanese factory
ships, and there are Japanese observ-
ers on ours.”

In 1971 the Soviet whaling fleets
caught 8,943 whales in the Antarctic
and 6,649 in the North Pacific. The
vast majority—over 80% —were sperm
whales. According to estimates of the
U.S. Committee for Humane Legisla-
tion, there are still some 250,000 sperm
whales in the world ocean.

“We strictly observe the recommen-
dations of the scientific committee of
the International Whaling Commis-

religious beliefs, whatever they

sion,” Stepanov concluded.

“We fully share the opinion that cer-
tain species: of whales —blue, hump-
back, grey and right, for example —
should be protected. We intend to de-
crease our quotas steadily year by year
until the whale population is stabil-
ized and growing. Incidentally,: com-
puters have calculated that there is no
danger that whales will become an ex-
tinct special of mammal, but that con-
servation steps should be taken. And
that is our position.”

* * *

Whaling in Canada has a rather long
history. It began centuries before the
white man came. On the west coast
of Vancouver Island the Nootka In-

dians, alone among hundreds of native

tribes, dared to hunt the mightiest of
mammals.

The whale hunt played an important
role in the social and religious life of
the Nootka. Risking their lives, the
eight-man canoe crew depended great-
ly on the skill of their hereditary chief,
who was always the harpooner. Before

the hunt began the chief and his wife
carried out an elaborate ritual of cer-
emonial bathing designed to induce the
whale to welcome his capture. Songs
were sung praising the whale and urg-
ing it to cooperate. A typical song went
something like this:
Whale Song

“Whale, I give you what you long
for—my good harpoon. Please hold it
firmly and do not let go. Whale, turn
toward the beach of Yahkis and you
will be proud to’see the young men
come down on the fine sandy beach to
see you, and they will praise your
strength and fatness. And you, whale,
will be proud then, and the young men
will cover your great body with duck
feathers and with the down of the
great eagle, the chief of all birds. For
this is what you wish as you travel
from one end of the world to the other,
spouting.”

During the spring whaling season,
the harpooner and his wife slept apart.
When the whaling canoe set out, the
wife lay down on.a newly-woven mat
and neither ate nor drank until her
husband returned.

The harpoon was a 14-foot shaft
with a large mussel-shell blade, bound
with whale-sinew to a barbed head of
bone. And inch-thick line made of plat-
ed whale-sinew was attached to the
harpoon-head. ;

Store of Food

The harpooner, standing in the bow,
had to launch his weapon at exactly
the right moment —when the whale
was just far enough below surface
that he could not flip his dreaded tail
and destroy canoe and hunters. Usually
several harpooris were planted before
the whale became exhausted and float-

ed to the surface. Then a crewman:

dived overboard, cut holes in the
whale’s upper and lower lips and tied
them together with a strong line. Small
floats made of the skins of hair-seals
were blown up and fastened to the
whale to increase his buoyancy. The
carcass was towed ashore and cut up
and divided among the people. A great
blubber feast was held, and the left-
overs were thrown back into the ocean.
Cooked blubber was dried and smoked
and stored for food. The precious whale
oil was kept in skin bags. At feasts it
was poured over wild strawberries and

__ raspberries.

It is many, many years since the
brave Nootka ventured forth in: their
“Chinook” cedar canoes in quest of
the mighty whale.

Urge Canadian aid fo

People manded that the Libyan

tion» °&8in a “cultural revolu-

boog, 22d burn all foreign

€astern» Whether western or

aty ig that contain reaction-
€as,

I
Statin, Pech to a large demon-
ime o Of support for the re-
Commarsite the Revolutionary
declared vite Libyan president
» “Burn the books that

er j
the , Ideas contrary to those of .

Selyeg lution, and divest your-
Ist : all Communist, capital-
thoughic Jewish - reactionary
Cour The only thoughts

tf Path» a to our revolution-
Se that 3 € continued, “are

Ppear in the Book of
’ the Koran.”

Plans Differ

G
tion affi called for the forma-
through People’s committees”
4 the country, and
h a the true revolution
Vious hee as of today. The pre-
Pareg Tee years have only pre-
&" 1h, 4 People to take pow-
© declared
The n ‘i

ight before at Zouara,

daffi said that -Libya’s battle
plans for the middle-east con-
flict differed from those of Sy-
ria and Egypt, who were preoc-
cupied, as he put it, with only
liberating the Sinai peninsula
and Golan heights. ;

He chastized those two coun-
tries for not granting bases to
the Libyan air force that would
have allowed them to operate
against Israel in the period fol-
lowing the shooting down of the
Libyan civilian plane on Feb. 21.

Gadaffi announced that “Li-
bya would not abandon her
obligations, but might be forced
to revise her plans. We might
cease to have relations with re-
gimes that claim to be revolu-
tionary, progressive and liberal
in the appeals they make to the
people.”

Right-Wing Echo

The proposals of the Libyan

president are not suprising. It
is not the first time that he has
manifested his anti-commun-
ism, along with a virulent anti-
semitism. x
Communists respect people’s

may be. But the hot-headed co-.

lonel is blinded by fanaticism,
which has found its echo recent-
ly in demonstrations by reac-
tionaries in Syria against the
united front government, which
includes Communists. Gadaffi
has publicly demanded several
times that the Communists be
thrown out of the Syrian gov-
ernment.

It is known that Gadaffi has
had numerous discussions with
the old leaders of the Syrian
right. .

It was also Gadaffi who help-
ed restore the reactionary Nu-
meiry regime in Sudan, cover-
ing up his intervention by a veil
of religion.

In recent months, Gadaffi’s
demands have become more and
more bitter His own ambitions
have been thwarted at every
move, In wanting to instruct
the entire world, he is going to
find himself in isolation, which
is prejudical to the interests of

the Libyan people.
—lI’Humanité

TORONTO — At its General
Council meeting, April 14-15,
the Canadian Peace Congress
severely criticized the Canadian
Government which, “by giving
political and economic support
to countries that imprison peo-
ple for their political beliefs and
activities, and at the same time,
refusing to use its diplomatic re-
lations with these countries to
intervene on behalf of political
prisoners, is thereby in “fact,
supporting the policy of placing
people who do not support the
government of their country, in
jail.

“Imprisoning and _ torturing
people because of their political
beliefs and activities is some-
thing people throughout the
world have rejected for years,”
the statement said. “Yet, in
countries such as South Viet-
nam, Brazil, Spain, Greece, Por-
tugal, Angola, Rhodesia, Mo-
zambique and South Africa,
thousands of people are jailed,

brutalized and tortured as part
of the official policy of their
country.

.“In the Saigon area alone, the
most reliable sources place the
number of people condemned to
suffer the horrors of medieval
prisons and ‘Tiger Cages’ at
close to a quarter of a million.”

The Canadian Peace Congress
urged the people of Canada ‘to
consider the implications of our
government’s complicity’ in a
policy of terror, and to ‘use
every means at our disposal to
have the government of Canada
change its position by directly
intervening, with. the objective
of freeing political prisoners in
every country in the world.”

EXPRESSION OF THANKS

Alice Buck and family wish
to thank the many comrades
and friends who extended
such warm and_ thoughtful

messages during our recent
bereavement.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, MAY 4, 1973—PAGE 9

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