U.S., others call on Iceland to drop whaling plan

OSLO (Reuters) - The United States and five other nations have called on Iceland's new government to drop a plan to step up whale hunts that whalers say would create jobs in the shattered economy, diplomats said on Monday.

The letter expressed "extreme disappointment" in a decision by the former government, which quit down last month over the island's financial collapse, to permit annual catches of 150 fin and 100 minke whales.

"We call on Iceland to reconsider this decision and focus on the advancement of the (International Whaling) Commission, and the long-term rather than the short-term interests of the whaling industry," it said.

The letter, seen by Reuters, was signed by senior diplomats in Reykjavik of the United States, Germany, Britain, France, Finland and Sweden. An international moratorium on whaling has been in force since 1986.

The new government of Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir, which took office this month, has said it will review the decision to resume whaling.

Iceland ended a 20-year ban on commercial whaling in August 2006, issuing quotas that ran through August 2007. After a temporary halt, the country resumed whaling in May last year, despite protests by environmentalists.

As one of its last acts before it resigned over the economic crisis, the center-right administration of Prime Minister Geir Haarde announced in January that Reykjavik would set five-year quotas for fin and minke whales.

Whalers have placed advertisements in Icelandic newspapers this year saying the hunts could bolster the economy by creating jobs for exporting whale meat to Japan.

"Whaling belongs to the past," said Martin Norman of environmental group Greenpeace. "There's no real market for the meat in Japan. This won't create jobs."

Fin whales are rated as endangered by the international Union for Conservation of Nature, which groups governments, scientists and conservation groups. Minkes are not among threatened species and are plentiful in the Atlantic.

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(Editing by Jon Boyle)