The Solomon Islands Prime Minister says his government does not support commercial whaling by any country but will support Japan's scientific whaling programme.
Gordon Darcy Lilo made the comment ahead of his departure for Japan to attend the sixth Pacific Alliance Leaders Meeting, in Okinawa, later this month.
Solomon Islands policy of opposing whaling has fluctuated several times in the past decade.
Mr Lilo says that it is important to find out more about the population of whales in the oceans and for this he supports Japan's programme of scientific research.
"The position of Solomon Islands is very clear: we are against commercial whaling but we do understand there needs to be scientific research on whaling to be carried out so that we can know the population of these species in our seas."
Gordon Darcy Lilo.
