TOKYO (AFP) – Environmental group Greenpeace on Tuesday condemned as "political persecution" Japan's arrest of two activists who face trial on charges of stealing whale meat during an investigation into alleged corruption in the whaling industry.
Greenpeace representatives from Japan, Europe, the United States, Brazil and Australia presented a letter for Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso "calling for the end to the political persecution" of the activists in a visit to coincide with human rights day on Wednesday.
The two Japanese Greenpeace members go on trial early next year on charges of stealing whale meat during their investigation.
"We want Prime Minister Aso to know that if Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki are to be tried for exposing whale meat embezzlement and working to end the killing of whales... then we should all be arrested," said Greenpeace Japan's Jun Hoshikawa.
Sato, one of Greenpeace's most high profile spokesmen in Japan, and Suzuki are on bail after being arrested in June. They face 10 years in prison if convicted, according to Greenpeace.
They took part in a lengthy investigation in which Greenpeace charged that whalers on the taxpayer-backed hunt had taken meat home and sold it on the black market.
Environmentalists and most Western nations strongly oppose Japan's whaling. The country kills hundreds of whales each year in the name of research, with the meat nonetheless ending up on dinner tables.
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