The article really doesn't do a good job of explaining what's going on, in particular: > It means Japan will be able to freely hunt species currently protected

The article really doesn't do a good job of explaining what's going on, in particular: > It means Japan will be able to freely hunt species currently protected by the IWC, like minke whales. Japan has already been hunting Minke whale, in 2016 they killed more than 300[1]. What's changing here is not the facts on the ground, but a maneuver in international diplomacy. Japan, Iceland and Norway have opposed the IWC's total ban on whaling. Japan has, until now, decided to work around this by claiming the whaling is "scientific", an obvious farce. It's been commercial whaling in all but name. Iceland and Norway have made no such claim, but issued commercial quotas in defiance of the moratorium. Now Japan is going to withdraw from the IWC entirely, which e.g. Canada did a long time ago[2] citing similar arguments. They're also going to restrict their whaling to their "territorial waters and economic zones", i.e. stop hunting in the Arctic. This was arguably the most controversial part of what they were doing before, e.g. Iceland and Norway don't hunt whales outside of their EEC. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whaling_in_Japan#Antarctica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whaling_in_Japan#Antarctica 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Whaling_Commission#Allegation_of_politicising_science https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Whaling_Commissi...