Officials charge Russian 'whale prison' owners

Russian authorities have ordered the release of at least 100 whales held captive in cages. President Vladimir Putin stepped in to demand authorities on the case release the caged animals, said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov last week.

The Kremlin reported that the 11 orcas and 87 beluga whales have been kept in a marine containment facility in unsatisfactory conditions and intended for sale in aquariums and to Chinese buyers. As whales are valuable on the black market, the activists suspect that they were captured to be sold to amusement parks in China.

Russia doesn't have any laws that ban the capture of these species. They can be caught, but only for scientific and educational purposes, and under specific circumstances, Kremlin spokesman Peskov said. 

The first images of the whales, kept in a bay near the Sea of Japan port town of Nakhodka, were released last year and triggered a wave of criticism globally. Aside from the Russian president, the case drew the ire of public and international film stars and activists.

Worldwide attention paid for the illegally captured and held whales

American actor Leonardo DiCaprio shared an online petition with his fans on Twitter in order to help free the whales. The petition gathered more than 900,000 signatures. 

Canadian-American actress Pamela Anderson also published an open letter to Putin on her website. 

“News about the 'whale jail’ near Nakhodka, the icy conditions, and the suffering of the orca and beluga whales is causing international concern. The Russian Government clearly shown its leadership by stopping the international sale of these orcas and belugas. By releasing these animals back into the wild, Russia can further demonstrate its leadership, which will be welcomed around the world,” the actress wrote. 

Greenpeace activists also attended a protest in Moscow against a so-called 'whale prison’, where the mammals are held in cages in Russia’s Far East. They carried banners that read "Freedom to orcas and white whales” during the demonstration on February 19. 

What happens now

Authorities will now look for ways to release the whales without harming them. Finding a solution for their release has caused delays and the animals currently remain confined. 

Russia's federal security service, the FSB said the owners of the four companies violated fishing laws. 

"Expertise showed that the animals were kept in unsatisfactory conditions, and must be released into their natural habitat," Russian news agency TASS cited the FSB as saying.

"We are doing everything we can,” said Ecology Minister Dmitry Kobylkin on Thursday, according to TASS.

"No one objects to releasing the orcas, but the most important thing is to release them properly," he said, pointing out that cold weather is one of the handicaps to freeing the whales without harming them.

What to know about these whales 

The International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) has the beluga whale on its red list of threatened species. According to the IUCN, the number of mature belugas in the world is 136,000. However, the website states: “Due to the lack of sampling, particularly in Russia, the total number of subpopulations is not precisely known.”

The site continues: “There are currently three main population centres for Belugas in Arctic Canada, High Arctic-Baffin Bay, Cumberland Sound, and Hudson Bay.” 

The population of Orca whales is estimated to be tens of thousands worldwide.