German Minister of Foreign Affairs meets harbour porpoise
WWF Germany handing over a neatly wrapped harbour porpoise mock-up to the German Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr Joschka Fischer during his visit to Wattforum in Toenning, Schleswig-Holstein. In the light of recent shipping disasters such as the accidents of the Sea Empress (Wales, UK 1996), Pallas (Wadden Sea, Germany 1998) and Erika (Brittany, France 1999), WWF urged Mr Fischer to improve EU policy on shipping safety and help introduce stringent international legislation to reduce the environmental impact from shipping. On this occasion, WWF also called upon Mr Fischer to support Europe wide protection measures for small cetaceans such as the Harbour Porpoise. Recently, the waters west of the German islands Sylt and Amrum had been designated as a cetacean sanctuary by the Federal State Schleswig-Holstein by seawards expansion of the Wadden Sea National Park boundaries.