Anti-whaling activists involved in a collision with a Japanese whaling ship near Antarctica accused whalers of using water cannon and acoustic weapons against them and vowed on Saturday to further obstruct the hunt.
The U.S.-based Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, which Tokyo sharply rebuked after Friday's collision, also said whalers had thrown golf balls and chunks of metal at its ship the Steve Irwin.
"The Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin continues to stand guard behind the Japanese floating abattoir called the Nisshin Maru, despite repeated assaults by frustrated and increasingly violent Japanese whalers," Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson said.
"The three Japanese harpoon boats are not in the area but the Sea Shepherd crew is prepared to obstruct them should they return," he said in a statement.
Japan's whaling fleet is in Antarctic waters for an annual hunt aimed at catching about 900 whales. Although Japan officially stopped whaling under a 1986 global moratorium, it continues to take hundreds of whales under a loophole allowing whaling for research purposes. Though most of the meat ends up in grocery stores and markets.
The Japanese-based Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR) says the crew of the Steve Irwin twice rammed the Yushin Maru 3 in Antarctica.
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has denied the claims.
