The International Whaling Commission yesterday adopted a conservation motion that ecology groups hailed as essential to preserving endangered whales and dolphins.
However, whalers said it could wreck the world body.
In a sharp shift for the 57-year-old organisation, the polarised members voted 25 to 20 to create a conservation committee that could make recommendations about problems facing marine mammals, or cetaceans. Whaling nation Japan said it would not participate in the committee and was considering withdrawing from the IWC.
The IWC is deeply split between pro-whalers, led by Japan and Norway and supported by many Caribbean islands, which want to reintroduce commercial whaling, and countries such as the US and many European nations, which favour more restrictions.
The conservation committee, to start work in 2004, could advise on cetaceans being trapped and drowned in fish nets, toxins in the oceans, climate change, and the use of sonar, which environmentalists say threatens whales with extinction.
"This is excellent news. There is a crisis in our oceans," said Mr Richard Page, oceans campaigner for Greenpeace. "It should prioritise and strengthen the conservation agenda." Outside the meeting, about 400 local schoolchildren, many with whales painted on their faces, rode a mock whaling ship and carried giant cardboard whales, pushing for a Yes vote.
The 50 IWC members, which include landlocked nations Switzerland and Mongolia, have achieved little but stalemate in recent years, since suspending commercial whaling in 1986 and establishing an Antarctic sanctuary in 1994.
Pro-whaling nations, which still catch around 1,600 whales a year, have said the IWC's sole purpose should be to determine sustainable quotas and insisted certain species, such as Minke whales, are abundant. - (Reuters)