To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will support measures at the June meeting of the International Whaling Commission that will end or seek to end imports of whale meat by Japan from Norway and Iceland. [HL1939]

Trade matters are within the competence of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and outside that of the International Convention on the Regulation of Whaling (ICRW), the parent treaty of the International Whaling Commission (IWC). The UK Government firmly support the CITES ban on the international trade in whale meat and whale products.

We are increasingly concerned about the trade in whale products between countries holding reservations to the CITES appendix I listing, or to countries which have not joined CITES. To eliminate the unacceptable risk of market-driven whaling in the future, we believe that contracting Governments to the IWC should lift all CITES reservations to cetacean species in order to aid negotiations on the future of the IWC.