ENVIRONMENTALISTS hit out at Japan today after the country imported 2,000 tons of frozen whale meat from Iceland.

The meat from fin whales was imported on Thursday from Iceland to Osaka, said Greenpeace Japan spokesman Junichi Sato.

The ship left Iceland in March carrying a cargo equivalent to almost all the whale meat exports for the last six years.

Greenpeace said it was puzzled by the size of the cargo, accounting for about two-thirds of annual consumption.

“We don’t know why Japan had to import such a huge volume of whale meat,” Mr Sato said.

“No matter what, we oppose such shipments.”

Critics claim the country already has large stocks of frozen whale meat from its own hunts that it cannot sell.

In December, Iceland said it had increased its 2014 quotas for whaling.

Since it resumed whaling despite an international moratorium in 2006, Iceland and Norway have come in for wide criticism from environmental groups.

Icelanders eat little whale meat and most of the catch is sent to the Japanese market.

In March, a UN court ruled that the annual foray into the Southern Ocean by Japanese whalers was a commercial hunt masquerading as science.

Tokyo said there would be no hunting in the Southern Ocean in the 2014-15 season, but vessels would carry out “non-lethal research.” 

Critics say Tokyo’s position is based on support for vested interests in the whaling industry rather efforts than to protect a source of food.