By Kim Tae-gyu

Korean fishermen or illegal hunters won’t be able to catch and market whales as freely as they have following government measures to strengthen related regulations on its anti-whaling policy.

The Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MIFFAF) said Thursday that it will enforce several measures to prevent fishermen from taking advantage of legal loopholes.

In line with the agreed codes of practice of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), commercial whaling has been prohibited in Korea since 1986 but concerns have sprouted that unlawful whale hunters sidestep the regulations and continue regardless.

``Thus far, Koreans have been allowed to market whales only when the endangered species get caught in a net by accident or are found beached,’’ MIFFAF official Lee Se-o said.

``However, some IWC member countries raised the possibility that hunters are pretending to have accidentally caught whales to market the expensive meat. In addition, the monitoring to prevent unreported commercial whaling will be beefed up.’’

First of all, DNA samples will be taken from all whales regardless of how they are caught. Annually approximately 80 whales are caught in nets and about 15 are killed by illegal hunters.

Also, all whales accidentally caught can only be sold through the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperatives, otherwise known as Suhyup.

Whale butchering will be allowed in designated places in advance so that individual processing will be impossible.

``We already phased in very strict regulations regarding illegal whaling. Whale hunters may face up to three years in prison and those who process or market them are subject to a maximum of two years,’’ Lee said.

``However, some people try to break the law. Hence, we decided to make the arm of the law longer through introducing various regulations against them.’’

After completing consultation with related ministries, the final measures will be announced this month before going into effect in October, according to the MIFFAF that projects the revised guidelines will see the country better comply with the IWC codes.

The IWC was formed voluntarily by countries, which wanted to counter the fast decreasing number of whales and currently more than 85 nations participate in the inter-governmental body.

But the number of the endangered sea mammals is continuing to fall and this prompted the IWC to announce an indefinite moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986, however, some countries have been exploiting loopholes.