"An Unwanted Catch: Conservationists Refocus To Save The Whales."

"Bycatch is now the No. 1 killer of cetaceans. Some say the IWC, one of the oldest international environmental organizations in history, hasn’t kept pace."

"When the International Whaling Commission (IWC) was founded in 1946, commercial hunting was the most significant threat to whale populations. But when the commission passed a whaling moratorium in 1982, the threat changed.

Bycatch is now the No. 1 killer of cetaceans, responsible for the death-by-entanglement of more than 300,000 whales and dolphins each year. Some say the IWC, one of the oldest international environmental organizations in history, hasn’t kept pace with the problem.

At the commission’s 70th annual meeting in Slovenia, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) proposed taking a more holistic approach to preventing bycatch. By refocusing those efforts, the group says, conservationists and fisheries could work together to protect threatened cetaceans."

Joseph Dussault reports for the Christian Science Monitor October 20, 2016.

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"Japan’s Whaling in Defiance of World Court Stirs Anger" (ENS)