Month: June 2004

Makah Loses Appeal

Last month this site noted that the Makah Indian Tribe was awaiting a judgment on its latest appeal in its quest to once again hunt whales. Earlier this month the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals denied the tribe’s request for a hearing before the full court, leaving in place a decision by a three judge panel of the court halting the whale hunt.

The three judge panel ruled that the whale hunt is subject to the Marine Mammal Protection Act despite the tribe’s treat with the U.S. government guaranteeing it the right to hunt whales.

Obtaining a permit to hunt whales under the Marine Mammal Protection Act will requires a full-scale environmental analysis of the hunt and years of delay.

Fund for Animals director Michael Markarian told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer that,

The Court of Appeals has been emphatic on this point . . . and it’s obviously something the American public doesn’t want.

Makah tribal member Wayne Johnson, however, said of the ruling that,

It’s another treaty broken by the United States.

Sources:

Court rebuffs Makah’s appeal over whaling. Lewis Kamb, Seattle Post-Intelligencer, June 8, 2004.

Makah whaling review denied. Christopher Dunagan, TheSunLink.Com, June 8, 2004.

CNN Gets Screwed By Anonymous Source

If it weren’t so emblematic of the news media in general, these paragraphs from a CNN story would be funny,

Meanwhile, a source told CNN that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld never approved a controversial interrogation technique called “water boarding.” That source had told CNN the opposite Monday.

The senior defense official who provided the original information to CNN now says Rumsfeld only approved “mild, noninjurious physical contact” with a high-level al Qaeda detainee at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and specifically did not approve a request to use water boarding.

How stupid does CNN think its readers/viewers are?

Okay, so on Monday CNN runs a story saying that Rumsfeld personally approved the general use of water boarding for prisoners at Guantanamo. One day later, CNN’s story is that the source lied to them on Monday, but should be believed on Tuesday that Rumsfeld only approved water boarding for a single prisoner. That, by the way, wasn’t news — the Washington Post reported earlier this month that Rumsfeld approved using a number of more severe interrogation tactics on Mohamed al Qahtani who the government believes was to have been the 20th hijacker in the 9/11 attacks.

Like most (all?) anonymous sources, this Pentagon official had an agenda and was basically using CNN for his or her own purposes. CNN and other news media are happy to go along, even when it leads to embarassing backtracking like this.

It’s interesting to note that despite all of the talk about the judicial review of the legality of torture, etc., that ultimately the working group that Rumsfeld chaired approved only seven interrogation techniques for use at Guantanamo that weren’t already part of standard U.S. military doctrine. According to the Washington Post,

Seven of those approved techniques are not included in U.S. military doctrine, and are listed as: “change of scenery up; change of scenery down; dietary manipulation; environmental manipulation; sleep adjustment (reversal) ; isolation for 30 days”; and a technique known as “false flag,” or deceiving a detainee into believing he is being interrogated by someone from another country.

Most of those tactics require interrogators notifying their commanders ahead of time that they plan to use them.

Source:

Guantanamo List Details Approved Interrogation Methods. Dana Priest and Bradley Graham, Washington Post, June 10, 2004.

Norway Wants to Increase Minke Whale Catch

In mid-May, Norway once again began its annual minke whale hunt, setting a quota of 670 whales to be killed through the end of August. But by 2006 the quota could be almost tripled to 1,800 whales, and may eventually expand to other species of whale.

In late May the Norwegian Parliament passed a resolution calling for an increase in the quota of minke whales to 1,800, and the Norwegian fisheries minister told the BBC that his country also wanted to begin using satellite transmitters to estimate the population size of other species.

Rune Frovik, a representative of Norway’s pro-whaling High Northern Alliance, told the BBC,

The resolution does leave some room for interpretation, though it’s pretty clear what Parliament wants, and the government will have to deliver.

We think the minke quota could be up to 1,800 by 2006. It’s not clear whether the scientific whaling being suggested should be lethal or non-lethal, but I don’t think the idea of killing whales is ruled out.

The proposal appears to apply in principle to virtually any species except bowheads and blue whales, though in practice I think the government is more interested in assessing stocks of fins, humpbacks, pilot whales and several dolphins.

According to the International Whaling Commission, about 1,400 whales are killed annually between Japan, Iceland and Norway. Increasing the quota would put that number over 2,500, and it would probably rise even further if Japan and Iceland decide, as they seem increasingly likely to do, to increase the number of whales they kill.

This proposal should add even more fireworks to the IWC’s annual meeting this July.

Source:

Norway seeks tripled whale catch. Alex Kirby, BBC News, May 28, 2004.

Uncaged Campaigns Upset Over Korean Xenotransplantation Plan

Earlier this month the Associated Press reported that South Korea was preparing to spend $73 million to kick start an effort to mass produce organs for transplant from pigs into human beings. The South Korean project will included 90 researchers and aims to produce pigs whose organs can be transplanted into human beings by 2010.

Dan Lyons of Uncaged Campaigns quickly put out a press release opposing the plan under the headline, “Korean pig organ transplant plans sparks international alarm.” From reading the press release, however, the “international alarm” appears to be limited to Lyons perhaps being outraged about it while on an intercontinental flight.

In the press release, Lyons is quoted as saying,

Pig-to-primate organ transplant experimentation has caused controversy across Europe and North America because of the appalling cruelty involved and the danger of creating a new viral epidemic. With South KoreaÂ’s terrible animal welfare reputation – symbolised by dog eating – and the recent lethal SARS outbreak in the Far East, this announcement will ring alarm bells around the world.

What is the point of Britain refusing to allow cross-species transplants if they take place in countries with no regulation? Viruses donÂ’t need passports.

Well, it should ring alarm bells in Great Britain — if it remains a hostile venue for animal research, groundbreaking work such as on xenotransplantation will simply shift to Asia, leaving the UK at risk of falling permanently behind in biosciences research.

As far as pig-to-primate organ transplant experimentation causing controversy, at least in North America the only group that seems to really find this controversial are animal rights activists. Of course, by that standard the diet of 98 percent of North Americans “has caused controversy.”

Lyons continues,

Xenotransplantation is more like bioalchemy than biotechnology. Drug companies have sacrificed tens of millions of pounds and tens of thousands of innocent animals, only to find that the whole idea is a cruel deception. With 180 million years of evolution separating pigs from humans, and advances in stem cell technology and other alternatives, we urge the South Koreans to consider whether this is really a good investment.

Lyons, of course, neglects to mention that those advances in stem cell technology are do in large measure thanks to exactly the sort of basic animal research that Uncaged Campaigns opposes. Whether or not xenotransplantation will ever be a viable alternative to human organ transplants remains to be seen, but it is certainly much more likely to happen than seeing Lyons and his compatriots actually maintain a consistent, truthful position about animal research.

Source:

Korea to mass-produce pig organs for human transplants. Associated Press, June 1, 2004.

More Than Half of British "Vegetarians" Eat Meat or Fish

A survey by Great Britain’s TNS Family Food Panel found that 58 percent of self-described vegetarians in that country ate meat, poultry or fish during the two-week period of the study.

TNS asked 11,000 people to maintain food diets for two weeks. Four percent of those in the study described themselves as vegetarians, but 23 percent ate red meat during the study, 20 percent ate poultry, and 51 percent of the self-described vegetarians ate fish.

Dietitian Juliette Kellow told the Telegraph,

We have seen something of a turnaround in the public perception of meat. There is more confidence in its safety and quality, and also growing awareness of the nutritional benefits. Atkins and other high protein diets have had an effect and there have been a number of celebrities like Madonna and Drew Barrymore who have abandoned vegetarianism.

Sources:

The ‘vegetarians’ who eat red meat. Nic Fleming, The Telegraph (London), June 7, 2004.

Quarter of Vegetarians ‘Eat Meat’ . Ju-Lin Tan, Press Association News, June 7, 2004.

Quarter of Brits ‘vegetarians’ eat meat! NewKerala.Com, June 7, 2004.

Z Magazine Defends Animal Rights Terrorism

The far left publication Z Magazine is one of the few outlets, other than animal rights groups and publications, to come out in support of the seven Stop Huntingdon Animal Rights activists recently charged with stalking.

Z Magazine has for years featured a pro-animal rights area on its web site, and after the arrests of the SHAC activists, Potter posted an article that claimed,

FBI agents rounded up seven American political activists from across the country Wednesday morning, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in New Jersey held a press conference trumpeting that “terrorists” were indicted.”

That’s right: “Terrorists.” The activists have been charged with violating the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act of 1992, which at the time garnered little public attention except from the corporations who lobbied for it. Their crime, according to the indictment, is “conspiring” to shut down Huntingdon Life Sciences, a company that tests products on animals and has been exposed multiple times for violating animal welfare laws.

That’s interesting, except there is not Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. The 1992 law that Potter refers to is the Animal Enterprise Protection Act, and makes a federal crime of the intentional physical disruption of an animal enterprise involving interstate travel. This is similar to dozens of other laws that make federal crimes out of any number of state crimes if interstate travel is involved.

Potter continues that,

To most, this [SHAC’s tactics] is effective — albeit controversial — organizing. According to the indictment, though, it’s “terrorism” because the activists aim to cause “physical disruption to the functioning of the HLS, an animal enterprise, and intentionally damage and cause the loss of property used by HLS.”

In fact, nowhere in the indictment are the individual activists or SHAC described as terrorists or their behavior as terrorism. In fact the only allusion to terrorism in the indictment is a couple mentions of the title of a document posted to the SHAC website called “Top 20 Terror Tactics” which included, according to the indictment,

demonstrations at oneÂ’s home using a loudspeaker;

abusive graffiti, posters and stickers on oneÂ’s car and house;

invading offices and, damaging property and stealing documents;

chaining gates shut, and blocking gates;

physical assault including spraying cleaning fluid into oneÂ’s eyes;

smashing the windows of oneÂ’s house while the individualÂ’s family was at home;

flooding oneÂ’s home while the individual was away; vandalizing oneÂ’s car;

firebombing oneÂ’s car;

bomb hoaxes;

threatening telephone calls and letters including threats to kill or injure oneÂ’s partner or children;

e-mail bombs in an attempt to crash computers;

sending continuous black faxes causing fax machines to burn out;

telephone blockades by repeated dialing to prevent the use of the telephone; and

arranging for an undertaker to call to collect oneÂ’s body.

Potter pretends that SHAC activities were run-of-the-mill protests,

The group uses home demonstrations, phone and email blockades, and plenty of smart-ass, aggressive rhetoric to pressure companies to cut ties with the lab.

First, phone blockades are explicitly illegal in the United States. SHAC is hardly the first group to be charged with this.

Second, email blockades are almost certainly illegal as well.

Third, SHAC also advocated and, according to the indictment, engaged in denial of service attacks against SHAC and its customers/affiliates. DOS attacks are also clearly illegal in the United States.

Certainly Potter is free to claim that SHAC’s recommendation of “physical assault including spraying cleaning fluid into oneÂ’s eyes” is not a direct inducement that would place a target of SHAC’s campaign in reasonable fear of bodily harm, but a jury might see things differently.

The strength of this case will likely boil down to what sort of information the U.S. Attorney’s office gained from their seizure of computers used by SHAC. The indictment is pretty clear in claiming that those indicted participated in a number of illegal acts which they then would claim in the name of some other group (such as the Animal Liberation Front), using encryption programs and similar tools to try to hide their direct involvement. If they can prove that in court, perhaps through evidence gleaned from the seized computers, then the feds have probably got a pretty strong case. If all they have is what we already know publicly about SHAC, then their case will be far weaker but still certainly winnable.

Source:

Animal Rights Arrests. Will Potter, Z Magazine, May 27, 2004.