Whale researchers studying whales during a six-week Antartic expedition say they have proof that Japan's annual killing of hundreds of whales for scientific purposes is unnecessary.

Scientists from Australia, France and New Zealand said they used non-lethal techniques to study whales - refuting Japan's claim that it is killing thousands of whales for scientific purposes.

Nick Gales, Expedition Leader:

"It's really important that we've gone through the International Whaling Commission and collectively worked out what are the important questions, the important research needs for the IWC to effectively manage and conserve whale populations and then looked at how you actually address those research needs. And all of those research needs, which are to do with how many whales there are, what they feed on, how they move among their food patches in the Southern Ocean, and how they link to their breeding populations. All of those questions can be and are being answered using non-lethal techniques, the type that we've deployed on this voyage."

The research challenges Japan's scientific program, which kills up to thousand of the mammals a year.

Critics say the program is a front for commercial whaling, with the whale meat sold for consumption in Japan.

The expedition that ended on Monday was the first in a five-year research programme in Antarctica that was proposed by the Australian government and agreed to by the IWC.

The scientists' research focused on whale numbers, what they eat, how they move between food patches and how they travel to and from their breeding grounds in the central Pacific.

A Japanese Fisheries Agency official in charge of whaling issues say that there are some data that can only be obtained through lethal ways, including age, stomach contents and fertility rate.

EBRU NEWS