The Times - UK - 04.12.2021

46 2GM Saturday December 4 2021 | the times

Wo r l d

Putin seeks guarantee

over Nato in Ukraine

Russia President Putin is to seek a

ban on Nato expansion to

Ukraine during a proposed call

with President Biden. Putin’s

comments came as Oleksii

Reznikov, the Ukrainian defence

minister, said Russia could invade

his country next month. He

added that the number of Russian

troops near Ukraine and in

Russian-annexed Crimea is

estimated at 94,300. The US has

threatened the Kremlin with the

toughest sanctions yet if it

launches an attack, while Russia

warned that any Nato troops on

Ukrainian soil would cross a “red

line”. The White House said there

was a “possibility” that a Putin-

Biden call would happen. (AP)

Iraq’s mighty rivers

could soon run dry

Iraq The Euphrates and the Tigris

could run dry within 20 years, a

report by Iraq’s water ministry

has warned. Climate change, war

and damming projects in Turkey

and Syria, where the rivers

originate, have led to a water

crisis in Iraq. The country uses

53 billion cubic metres a year but

if river levels continue to decline

it will be short by 80 per cent by

2035, the report estimated.

Muslim workers kill

manager over prayers

Pakistan A mob of factory

workers tortured and murdered

their Sri Lankan manager and

burnt his body in the street in

Sialkot after accusing him of

blasphemy. One worker said that

Priyantha Diyawadana “did not

allow Muslim workers to pray...

he removed the Islamic stickers

from the office”. The provincial

government said at least fifty

people had been arrested so far.

France wins big arms

deal with Gulf state

United Arab Emirates France has

won its largest weapons export

contract, supplying 80 upgraded

Rafale fighter jets to the United

Arab Emirates in a deal worth

€16 billion. The Gulf state is also

buying 12 Airbus-built combat

helicopters. The deals will boost

France’s defence industry after

the loss of the sale of submarines

to Australia, which instead signed

a pact with the UK and US. (AP)

Fire-tainted grapes turn

out to be hard stuff

United States A Californian

vineyard that was damaged by

last year’s wildfires has saved its

smoke-tainted grapes by turning

them into vodka. Pine Ridge

Vineyards, which is based in Napa

County, partnered with Hangar 1

Vodka to create Smoke Point,

which is said to have a hint of

“barbecue” taste. All proceeds

from sales go to the California

Fire Foundation. (Reuters)

Minister resigns after

criticising Saudi Arabia

Lebanon The information

minister has quit in an attempt to

ease the diplomatic crisis with

Saudi Arabia and other Gulf

countries. It was prompted by

George Kordahi’s televised

criticism of the Saudi role in the

war in Yemen as futile aggression.

In response, Riyadh recalled its

ambassador and banned all

Lebanese imports, worsening the

country’s economic crisis. (AP)

Ayukawa in northeastern Japan may
not have much by way of culture and
history but it certainly makes the most
of what it does have.
It has declared itself the Town of
Whaling. Next to the port is a shopping
centre where visitors can buy whale
bone jewellery and cuddly whale toys
and dine on whale sushi and whale cur-
ry. Troupes perform whale-themed
dances at the annual Whale Festival,
while stalls sell dishes of fried whale.
The local Buddhist temple has an
obelisk commemorating the spirits of
whales. Whale Land, a multimedia
museum, is housed in a whale-shaped
building with displays of whale skele-
tons, harpoons, a whaling ship and vid-
eos on the history of whaling and its
revival as an industry of the future.
Whaling is back and Ayukawa is
excited. Three years ago, amid intense
controversy and international criti-
cism, Japan walked out of the Inter-
national Whaling Commission (IWC),
the body that imposed a worldwide ban
on the hunting of whales.
Released from its strictures, Japanese
whalers carried out commercial whal-
ing for the first time in more than three
decades. The remaining fleet of five pri-
vately owned coastal whaling boats, as
well as one large whaling company,
have been allowed to go out hunting.
Two of the boats are based in Ayuka-
wa. To many people around the world,
for whom whaling is the indefensible
slaughter of precious creatures, this
looked like a brutally retrograde step.
But the fanfare in Ayukawa conceals
a more complicated story, in which
there is as much desperation as celebra-
tion — and in which the whales
actually come out on top.
The notion of commercial whaling is
misleading because no one is making
any money out of it, nor expects to for
years to come. After Japan submitted to
the IWC ban in 1988, a loophole permit-
ted “scientific whaling”, in which the
government paid for “research” into
whale numbers — a thinly veiled pre-
text to keep the industry alive. As a
commercial proposition, however,
whaling is fraught with difficulty.
The cold, dangerous life of a whaler
has little appeal for the young. The age
of whale hunters is rising. One of the
engineers who sails out of Ayukawa is
in his seventies. Mysterious changes in

the ocean and patterns of marine life

have made finding whales more diffi-

cult than ever. The boats often have to

sail far north, beyond the island of Hok-

kaido, with the expense of fuel, process-

ing the whales in faraway ports and

transporting them back to Ayukawa.

“At this stage, it’s difficult because

there are so many costs,” Nobuyuki Ito,

president of Ayukawa Whaling, said.

In the years since commercial whal-

ing was resumed, the coastal boats have

failed to reach their permitted quota of

120 whales a season. And even when

the meat is ready, few Japanese are

interested. After the Second World

War, whale meat was an important

source of protein, served regularly in

school dinners. In the wealthy Japan of

the 21st century, however, it competes

with a vast range of foods. In 1962,

about 200,000 tonnes of whale meat

was sold nationally. In 2016, the figure

was 3,000 tonnes, compared with

2.6 million tonnes of pork and 2.4 mil-

lion tonnes of chicken.

Whaling communities are trying to

promote the image of whale meat as

sophisticated haute cuisine. The Japa-

nese, however, eat less whale than

horsemeat — and that is not popular.

“People have not really been exposed to

whale cuisine for 30 years,” Kazuhisa

Miyakawa, who promotes the whale

industry for the nearby city of Ishino-

maki, said. “The price is relatively high,

compared to chicken or pork.”

Ayukawa is trying to revise the

modern diet by introducing whale meat

into local schools twice a year. But there

is no sign that this will transform the

meat’s image any time soon.

With high costs and low demand, the

industry relies on subsidies – estimated

by Junko Sakuma, an independent

researcher, at about £34 million a year.

This covers half the cost of Ito’s whal-

ing operations, although the govern-

ment has intimated that such a safety

net will not be provided indefinitely.

Much emotion is discharged by those

who oppose whaling on moral grounds

— Boris Johnson once described it as

“blasphemously cruel”. Many Japanese

environmental campaigners, however,

welcome the return to commercial

whaling for a simple reason: it has led to

fewer whales being slaughtered and it

promises to kill off the industry within

a generation.

“The government took up commer-

cial whaling to save face,” Sakuma said.

“The result is that the number of

whales killed is far less. Antipathy from

foreign countries made them stronger.

When white people tell them what they

should and shouldn’t eat, that gives

them power. It’s best to remain quiet

and not fuel the argument.”

In the centuries-long battle of man

against whale, the hunters are now an

endangered species.

A whale is

unloaded at a port

in Hokkaido after

Japan left the

International

Whaling

Commission. Boats

had previously

travelled to the

seas off Australia

to conduct

“scientific whaling”

missions

Hunters set sail but whalers

are an endangered species

Fishermen stage defiant

return to the ocean

but tastes in Japan

have changed, writes

Richard Lloyd Parry

MASANORI TAKEI/AP

For more than a decade Alvin Chau has
rarely been out of the headlines in
China. Known as the Junket King for
his skill in luring high rollers to casinos,
his black book was crammed with Bei-
jing’s ultra-rich elite. This year it was re-
ported that he had paid his mistress
£29 million after their affair ended.
Today, however, Chau, 47, is behind
bars as the most high-profile target of
President Xi’s crackdown on the
gambling haven of Macau. The chief

Gambling king’s arrest raises stakes for China’s elite

executive of Suncity Group has been

arrested by police in Macau on allega-

tions that he ran online gambling plat-

forms accessible from mainland China,

where all betting is banned except for

the state lottery.

Chau has apparently confessed to the

charges. Analysts suggest that his de-

tention is a significant escalation in Xi’s

crusade against the semi-autonomous

Macau. Miao Shengming, head of the

first prosecutor’s office at the Supreme

People’s Procuratorate, claimed that

Chau’s clients were making “astronom-

ical bets” leading to “massive outflows

of capital”. Xi is taking an increasingly

dim view of the image of the former

Portuguese colony, widely viewed as a

den of vice in Asia and known for its sex

trade, organised crime and lavish

spending.

Beijing estimates that more than

£150 billion flows out of China via

cross-border gambling each year, much

of it handled by Suncity. Opaque

financing and the power of Macau’s

Triad gangs allow it to serve as a base

for money laundering by China’s elite.

China has categorised the huge flows of

cash as a “national security risk”. The

arrest of Chau has prompted fears that

others may fall foul of the crackdown.

According to the magazine Foreign

Policy, between 1999 and 2016 visitors

from mainland China grew from

800,000 to 17 million a year.

Chau is said to be worth at least £2 bil-

lion. He ran a network of 12,000 agents

and more than 80,000 customers on

the mainland, and established “asset

management companies” to help

gamblers purchase chips, collect debts

and settle accounts through illegal fi-

nancial services, police said. Suncity

closed its gaming rooms this week.

China
Didi Tang Beijing