Celeb gets cold shoulder in Japan
Associated Press
TAIJI, Japan
“Heroes” star Hayden Panettiere and her boyfriend, world champion boxer Wladimir Klitschko, received a chilly reception Friday in the Japanese fishing village of Taiji, where they called for an end to its annual dolphin hunt.
Panettiere said she would “love to be a spokesperson” for the town if it abandons the hunt. Her visit to Taiji comes just weeks after “The Cove,” a gory depiction of Taiji’s dolphin slaughter, won the Oscar for best documentary.
The celebrity couple arrived in the morning with a small group of environmental activists. Panettiere tried to meet the mayor and representatives from the local fisheries union, but she and Jeff Pantukhoff, an anti-whaling activist from the U.S., were blocked at the door of the town hall.
SDLqWe are trying to peacefully come up with better ideas as to how to generate income and utilize the nature here,” Panettiere said. “We’ve been to Taiji before, and it’s a beautiful place with beautiful wildlife.”
If Taiji were to quit killing dolphins, “I’d love to be a spokesperson or to help generate tourism,” she said.
Fishermen in the village consider the hunt a proud legacy. But it has long been targeted by hard-core environmentalists and animal lovers, and the Oscar has given the opposition more mainstream attention.
Panettiere, followed by a crowd of media throughout the day, later walked through a large hole in a barrier along a path leading to the famous cove depicted in the movie. The cove was strewn with nets used to trap the dolphins, as well as firewood and debris left by the hunters.
Panettiere posed for photographs as she walked along the small pebbly beach for several minutes, but then two town officials ran up, and after a tense exchange, everyone left. A fisherman pulled up several minutes later in a truck and boarded up the hole.
Panettiere, who plays an indestructible cheerleader on the hit U.S. TV series “Heroes,” is also the spokeswoman for the “Save the Whales Again!” campaign, which wants to halt Taiji’s dolphin hunt.
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