The Korea Times
amn_close.png
amn_bl.png
National
  • Politics
  • Foreign Affairs
  • Multicultural Community
  • Defense
  • Environment & Animals
  • Law & Crime
  • Society
  • Health & Science
amn_bl.png
Business
  • Tech
  • Bio
  • Companies
amn_bl.png
Finance
  • Companies
  • Economy
  • Markets
  • Cryptocurrency
amn_bl.png
Opinion
  • Editorial
  • Columns
  • Thoughts of the Times
  • Cartoon
  • Today in History
  • Blogs
  • Tribune Service
  • Blondie & Garfield
  • Letter to President
  • Letter to the Editor
amn_bl.png
Lifestyle
  • Travel & Food
  • Trends
  • People & Events
  • Books
  • Around Town
  • Fortune Telling
amn_bl.png
Entertainment & Arts
  • K-pop
  • Films
  • Shows & Dramas
  • Music
  • Theater & Others
amn_bl.png
Sports
amn_bl.png
World
  • SCMP
  • Asia
amn_bl.png
Video
  • Korean Storytellers
  • POPKORN
  • Culture
  • People
  • News
amn_bl.png
Photos
  • Photo News
  • Darkroom
amn_NK.png amn_DR.png amn_LK.png amn_LE.png
  • bt_fb_on_2022.svgbt_fb_over_2022.svg
  • bt_twitter_on_2022.svgbt_twitter_over_2022.svg
  • bt_youtube_on_2022.svgbt_youtube_over_2022.svg
  • bt_instagram_on_2022.svgbt_instagram_over_2022.svg
The Korea Times
amn_close.png
amn_bl.png
National
  • Politics
  • Foreign Affairs
  • Multicultural Community
  • Defense
  • Environment & Animals
  • Law & Crime
  • Society
  • Health & Science
amn_bl.png
Business
  • Tech
  • Bio
  • Companies
amn_bl.png
Finance
  • Companies
  • Economy
  • Markets
  • Cryptocurrency
amn_bl.png
Opinion
  • Editorial
  • Columns
  • Thoughts of the Times
  • Cartoon
  • Today in History
  • Blogs
  • Tribune Service
  • Blondie & Garfield
  • Letter to President
  • Letter to the Editor
amn_bl.png
Lifestyle
  • Travel & Food
  • Trends
  • People & Events
  • Books
  • Around Town
  • Fortune Telling
amn_bl.png
Entertainment & Arts
  • K-pop
  • Films
  • Shows & Dramas
  • Music
  • Theater & Others
amn_bl.png
Sports
amn_bl.png
World
  • SCMP
  • Asia
amn_bl.png
Video
  • Korean Storytellers
  • POPKORN
  • Culture
  • People
  • News
amn_bl.png
Photos
  • Photo News
  • Darkroom
amn_NK.png amn_DR.png amn_LK.png amn_LE.png
  • bt_fb_on_2022.svgbt_fb_over_2022.svg
  • bt_twitter_on_2022.svgbt_twitter_over_2022.svg
  • bt_youtube_on_2022.svgbt_youtube_over_2022.svg
  • bt_instagram_on_2022.svgbt_instagram_over_2022.svg
  • Login
  • Register
  • Login
  • Register
  • The Korea Times
  • search
  • all menu
  • Login
  • Subscribe
  • Photos
  • Video
  • World
  • Sports
  • Opinion
  • Entertainment & Art
  • Lifestyle
  • Finance
  • Business
  • National
  • North Korea
  • 1

    Song Joong-ki marries British woman, expects baby

  • 3

    Suicidal pedestrian saved over Han River bridge

  • 5

    Kim Jung-hyun returns to small screen with 'Kokdu: Season of Deity'

  • 7

    Youth, foreign drug offenders increase threefold in 5 years

  • 9

    INTERVIEWBusan has potential to be world-class city, says mayor

  • 11

    'Someday or One Day' cast says film spin-off has new plot

  • 13

    Seoul International School celebrates 50th anniversary

  • 15

    Over 76% of South Koreans support development of nuclear weapons

  • 17

    Base taxi fare to rise by 1,000 won to 4,800 won next month

  • 19

    S. Korea mistakenly fires machine gun near border with N. Korea

  • 2

    Japanese teen romance film attracts 1 mil. Korean viewers for 1st time in 21 yrs

  • 4

    Korea to lift indoor mask mandate Monday

  • 6

    US four-star general warns of war with China in 2025

  • 8

    K-pop releases for February

  • 10

    NK rejects alleged arms trading with Russia, warns of 'undesirable result'

  • 12

    Samsung to introduce low-carbon diet for employees to help tackle climate change

  • 14

    Plum trees, pheasants and promises of old Korea

  • 16

    Koreans reluctant to unmask on first day of eased indoor mask rule

  • 18

    Main opposition leader faces pressure to resign in case of indictment

  • 20

    3 dead, 4 hurt in upmarket Los Angeles neighborhood

Close scrollclosebutton

Close for 24 hours

Open
  • The Korea Times
  • search
  • all menu
  • Login
  • Subscribe
  • Photos
  • Video
  • World
  • Sports
  • Opinion
  • Entertainment & Art
  • Lifestyle
  • Finance
  • Business
  • National
  • North Korea
National
  • Forestry
Tue, January 31, 2023 | 11:54
Controversial Beluga whale surfing bites Geoje Sea World
Posted : 2020-06-29 17:07
Updated : 2020-06-29 18:25
Ko Dong-hwan
Print PreviewPrint Preview
Font Size UpFont Size Up
Font Size DownFont Size Down
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • kakaolink
  • whatsapp
  • reddit
  • mailto
  • link
Animal and environment advocate groups at Gwanghwamun Square in Seoul's Jongno District, June 26, perform a skit to portray alleged abuse on Beluga whales and bottlenose dolphins at Geoje Sea World in South Gyeongsang Province and call for the venue's shutdown. Yonhap
Animal and environment advocate groups at Gwanghwamun Square in Seoul's Jongno District, June 26, perform a skit to portray alleged abuse on Beluga whales and bottlenose dolphins at Geoje Sea World in South Gyeongsang Province and call for the venue's shutdown. Yonhap

By Ko Dong-hwan

Geoje Sea World faces its worst crisis since opening in 2014 as animal activists and citizens condemn how it has been abusing ecologically vulnerable Beluga whales to entertain customers ― including allowing visitors to surf aboard the animals.

Ten animal and environment advocate groups on June 26 demonstrated at Seoul's Gwanghwamun Square demanding the port city venue in South Gyeongsang Province be closed and release its animals. The protesters also demanded the central government ban animal experiences at leisure sites to prevent zoonosis and introduce laws that protect endangered animals from being imported and exhibited.

The activists said the animals, which dive as deep as 700 meters in the wild, are not suitable to live inside an aquarium 4-6 meters deep and with ambient noises from the venue reaching 80 decibels ― above the maximum safety level of 70. The animals' "mental distress from being exposed to the visitors visually and audibly is unimaginably high and will weaken their immune systems," according to activists.

Hot Pink Dolphins, Sea Shepherd Korea, the Korean Animal Welfare Association and other groups said that when visitors "experience" the animals by surfing, hugging and kissing them, it creates the risk of tuberculosis, leptospirosis and brucellosis.

The venue's programs, disregarding preservation of ecological diversity, have no educational value but only offer fun to visitors, according to the activists.

"Marine mammals in Korea are protected so poorly that it falls behind the current global movement of banning whales from being locked and forced to do exhibitions or performances," according to activists.

On June 29, Geoje Sea World issued a disclaimer on its homepage in response to last week's protest as well as mounting attention from citizens whose petitions on the presidential office website demanding legal protection for the animals reached 41,000 as of Monday. The disclaimer largely tried to clear the company of any guilt.

The marine park said it tried to relieve the animals' need to move around with "social training" and "emotional interactions with trainers." It also said International Association for Aquatic Animal Medicine's president-elect Michael Briggs was "managing the venue" and that it adhered to Five-Freedoms, animal welfare guidelines adopted by global animal-friendly groups.

"We are proud to say that our visitors can learn marine biodiversity's importance and nature's significance," the company said.

Animal and environment advocate groups at Gwanghwamun Square in Seoul's Jongno District, June 26, perform a skit to portray alleged abuse on Beluga whales and bottlenose dolphins at Geoje Sea World in South Gyeongsang Province and call for the venue's shutdown. Yonhap
A visitor rides on a Beluga whale at Geoje Sea World. The animal experience was promoted by the marine park on social network as "VIP ride experience." Korea Times file

The whole Beluga brouhaha began on June 19 when Geoje Sea World promoted on its social network its "VIP Ride Experience" which allows customers to ride on the back of the whale and a bottle-nosed dolphin for 70 minutes and have themselves photographed for 200,000 won ($167). The company has been offering the program before the date.

But the online post drew mounting criticism for animal cruelty because Beluga whales are classified "near threatened" by the World Wildlife Fund and "least concern" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources' Red List.

Public ire increased after people learned that six dolphins died at the venue from 2015 until 2017. A joint government-civic inspection group checked the site and concluded that "20 to 30 meter-large artificial habitats are too small for dolphins that travel more than 100 kilometers a day in the wild."

The group also saw a dolphin repeatedly hitting itself against a wall and jumping up and down on the same spot, which they saw as "symptoms of extreme distress."

Geoje Sea World, a foreign capital enterprise by Singaporean Lim Chee-yong, who also owns Manila Ocean Park in the Philippines, opened in 2014 with four Beluga whales and 16 bottlenose dolphins.

Shortly after the opening, Lim was mired in an attempted shipment of Beluga whales to the Philippines, which the media called "laundering the whales' nationalities" by abusing lax wild-animal import regulations in Korea. But the Philippines government refused to allow the whales to be imported, because the country's climate was not suitable.

In 2015 the marine park sold five bottlenose dolphins, which it had bought from Japan's Taiji town, to The Land of Legends in Turkey for entertainment purposes. The approval from the Korean environment ministry to resell the animals under the Least Concern category of both the WWF and the Red List took only two weeks.

The Korean Animal Welfare Association said Turkey bought the dolphins from Korea because it wanted to avoid global criticism by buying them directly from Taiji, infamous for traditional dolphin slaughtering.

Hot Pink Dolphins said Korea, from 2002 until 2013, imported the fourth-most dolphins from Taiji in the world. The group said Korea was "red-tagged not just the leading dolphin importer from Taiji but also the world-top dolphin launderer."

The South Gyeongsang Provincial Office on Monday told the Hankyoreh daily it was looking into the alleged abuse of Beluga whales at Geoje Sea World and were "in the process of confirming the issue and planning to inspect the venue."


Emailaoshima11@koreatimes.co.kr Article ListMore articles by this reporter
 
Top 10 Stories
1Over 76% of South Koreans support development of nuclear weapons Over 76% of South Koreans support development of nuclear weapons
2Koreans reluctant to unmask on first day of eased indoor mask rule Koreans reluctant to unmask on first day of eased indoor mask rule
3[ANALYSIS] Pandemic awakens demand for data-driven automation ANALYSISPandemic awakens demand for data-driven automation
4Stock-leveraged investments rise again amid bullish KOSPI Stock-leveraged investments rise again amid bullish KOSPI
5Busan seeks to take lead in expo race after BIE's April visit Busan seeks to take lead in expo race after BIE's April visit
6Retailers seek to bolster beauty product sales as lifting of mask mandate approaches Retailers seek to bolster beauty product sales as lifting of mask mandate approaches
7SPC opens 120th Paris Baguette store in US SPC opens 120th Paris Baguette store in US
8Biohealth geared for growth Biohealth geared for growth
9NK slams NATO chief's Seoul visit as 'prelude to war'NK slams NATO chief's Seoul visit as 'prelude to war'
10Korea-US defense talks likely to bring up extended deterrence Korea-US defense talks likely to bring up extended deterrence
Top 5 Entertainment News
1Song Joong-ki marries British woman, expects babySong Joong-ki marries British woman, expects baby
2Kim Jung-hyun returns to small screen with 'Kokdu: Season of Deity' Kim Jung-hyun returns to small screen with 'Kokdu: Season of Deity'
3K-pop releases for February K-pop releases for February
4'Someday or One Day' cast says film spin-off has new plot 'Someday or One Day' cast says film spin-off has new plot
5Itaewon music fest brings love to the healing process Itaewon music fest brings love to the healing process
DARKROOM
  • Nepal plane crash

    Nepal plane crash

  • Brazil capital uprising

    Brazil capital uprising

  • Happy New Year 2023

    Happy New Year 2023

  • World Cup 2022 Final - Argentina vs France

    World Cup 2022 Final - Argentina vs France

  • World Cup 2022 France vs Morocco

    World Cup 2022 France vs Morocco

CEO & Publisher : Oh Young-jin
Digital News Email : webmaster@koreatimes.co.kr
Tel : 02-724-2114
Online newspaper registration No : 서울,아52844
Date of registration : 2020.02.05
Masthead : The Korea Times
Copyright © koreatimes.co.kr. All rights reserved.
  • About Us
  • Introduction
  • History
  • Contact Us
  • Products & Services
  • Subscribe
  • E-paper
  • RSS Service
  • Content Sales
  • Site Map
  • Policy
  • Code of Ethics
  • Ombudsman
  • Privacy Statement
  • Terms of Service
  • Copyright Policy
  • Family Site
  • Hankook Ilbo
  • Dongwha Group