On 16-20 June, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) will meet in St. Kitts. This is the committee which banned whaling worldwide in 1986, although large numbers of whales are still being killed, many of these as a result of so-called \"scientific whaling\", which is allowed under an international loophole. This year, however, the Japanese lobby on the IWC will probably have purchased enough votes to overturn the ban and restart commercial whaling around the world. Whaling is often carried out in an atrocious and inhumane way. Examples of methods for killing whales include: * explosive harpoons, which puncture the skin of the whale and then explode inside the body. * capturing a whale and tying it to the side of a ship so that the blowhole is submerged and it slowly suffocates. * riddling the whale with bullets and letting it die slowly in agony Not only this, but many species of whales are now endangered due to this threat including the famous blue whale. Whaling countries have claimed that they hunt for scientific research, utilising the loophole in the IWC\'s ban, but other humane methods for collecting identical data already exist. There is no need for 25,000 whales to have been killed since 1986 because of this loophole. If the needless slaughter of some of nature\'s most beautiful and endangered animals concerns you, please sign this petition NOW urging the IWC NOT to reverse their ban and instead to eradicate this loophole. Thank you.