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Nations split over whaling ban

AMSTERDAM - A showdown looms this week over the 25-year ban on commercial whaling: Should it be eased, which might mean fewer whales are killed? Or should it remain - leaving Japan, Norway and Iceland to hunt down as many whales as they want?

The International Whaling Commission begins a five-day meeting today in Morocco's Atlantic Ocean resort of Agadir - arguably its most important gathering since 1986, when a moratorium on commercial whaling halted the factory-style slaughter of tens of thousands of animals every year.

A compromise that would suspend the whaling ban has been drafted by the agency's chairman, but it's an unhappy option for nations that abhor whaling. The deal would legitimize commercial hunting in exchange for a drop in the number of whales actually killed by those claiming exemptions to the ban - Japan, Norway and Iceland.

The proposal, the agency says, would end the wildcat whaling that still kills up to 2,000 whales a year, including species on the verge of extinction. Japan's unrestricted whale hunt, allegedly for "scientific research," currently sends more whale meat to sushi bars than laboratories.

Since the ban took place, about 33,600 whales have been killed, according to the Animal

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