Tomohiko Taniguchi was the official voice of Japan for the last three years. The spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo fronted the international media every day to answer, avoid and argue questions. Of the hundreds of matters he dealt with, the one he dreaded most was defending Japan's whaling program. It was part of his job to defend official policy.
"I was being summoned by CNN, BBC and ABC on this issue far more than any other issue," Taniguchi says. "I hated this issue because there's no point in Japan sticking to its position," he tells the Herald in flawless English.
No point? Today Taniguchi is an adviser to Japan's Minister for Foreign Affairs. But, since July, he is no longer an employed official, so he is free to speak his mind. And he does.
"The Japanese whaling industry generates revenues of 7.5 billion yen a year, which is $120 million at the current exchange rate. It's tiny."
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"Japan has nil national interest in the whaling industry," Taniguchi continues. "The stake for Japan is near zero. If Australians criticise the Japanese auto industry, Japan must do everything possible to protect the auto industry. This is not the auto industry."
He is writing a long piece for a Japanese magazine, Wedge, to ask Japanese to consider the balance sheet of national interests. On the other side of the ledger, he contends, "this issue is doing substantial damage to Japan's image in Australia, the US, Canada, the UK, New Zealand," the entire English-speaking world.
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Taniguchi hopes the whaling industry will fade away. Whale meat is not a big seller, an uneconomic activity. About 80 Japanese parliamentarians support whaling, but it is a core issue for only six to eight. With the Government's deficit worsening, the annual subsidy becomes harder to defend. But Taniguchi advises Australia, and others, not to press too hard, lest this only entrench Japanese political support for whaling.
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Many countries have an ugly blemish that mars the total image and makes other peoples recoil in distaste. China has Tibet, the US has Guantanamo Bay, Turkey has Armenian genocide, and Japan has whaling. Uneconomic and increasingly costly to Japan's image, Taniguchi expects it will disappear in a few years. But in the meantime, he fears that escalation could damage the interests of Australia as well as Japan. "Japanese children would be horrified to learn that Australians routinely kill and even eat kangaroos, which they think are much cuter than whales."
Australians aren't against whaling because whales are cute! Kangaroos are not an endangered species, and provided they are harvested humanely, provide a good source of non-greenhouse generating protein in a sustainable manner.
Kangaroos are also confined to Australia, and do not cross global oceans and thus not a global concern, unless of course they are endangered or killed inhumanely.
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It has been another long week at work. This morning, I had multiple urgent tasks to be completed in the morning. No problem, but I deserve another holiday soon!
Tonight, I watched the Resident Evil: Extinction. The third in the series of movies about zombies and based on a computer game. I still don't understand the scientific logic of zombies. If zombies are technically dead and decomposing, why do they need to eat?
It must have been pretty nerve-racking having such a large animal swim up to you.
It was amazing. I mean, I have to tell you there were days when I was at the bottom at 70 feet, and here comes this bus swimming down. I’m standing on the bottom, and as it comes down, I get on my knees, lean over backwards—my scuba tank is now digging into the sand. And of course their eyes are on the side of their heads, so it had to turn and look at me. It came within inches. Here’s this softball-size whale eye looking at me. But then it stops—stops on a dime. It’s just hovering there, and literally one flick of its tail, and it would have crushed me like a bug. But it doesn’t. It was just highly curious. 
