By Bianca Frigiani

QUINTAY, Chile, June 23 (Reuters) - Chile declared a permanent ban on whaling in its waters on Monday, as conservation groups feared an International Whaling Commission meeting it is hosting will fail to halt world No.1 whaler Japan.

Speaking at a former whale processing plant that Chile closed in 1967, President Michelle Bachelet also sent a bill to Congress proposing a whale sanctuary along Chile's coastline and declared the whale a national monument.

"We have chosen this place, the Quintay whale plant, to highlight the Chile and the world of the past, in which there was no awareness of social and environmental consequences," Bachelet said.

"Chile ... wants to give the world a clear sign of its will to protect whales in its waters," she added. "This initiative is a pledge to the world of the future."

Chile's whaling moratorium had been set to expire in 2025.

In the capital Santiago, the annual whaling commission meeting began with nations from the Americas to Europe voicing concern about rising catches of Minke whales in the north pacific, namely in Japanese and Korean waters.

Outside the venue, protesters flanked by a giant blue inflatable whale chanted "Murderers, it's your fault," and held aloft banners emblazoned with "Stop the slaughter" and "No blood for tradition".

Police said they detained 15 protesters.

"The species is going to be extinct, because they are catching a lot of whales," said 14-year-old schoolboy Martin Lopez, holding a Greenpeace leaflet as music blared out. "We are here to say we are against whaling."

"What Japan is doing is bad."

JAPAN DEFIANT

Japan says it is misunderstood, denies the 1,000 whales it hunts each year for scientific purposes despite a 1986 moratorium are making it to the dinner table, and says it is also in favor of conservation.

But it also sees whaling as a cultural tradition of its coastal communities and believes in sustainable commercialization of the world's biggest mammals. Japanese supermarkets and restaurants offer whale meat, though demand for the delicacy is declining.

Japan has presented the IWC with a resolution to legalize coastal whaling. It is the same resolution that anti-whaling countries blocked a year ago, leading to threats from Japan that it would abandon the 62-year-old IWC.

"We don't look at (scientific whaling) as a loophole, because we don't see anything wrong in commercialism per se as long as it is sustainable," Ryotaro Suzuki, senior coordinator of the ocean division of Japan's Foreign Ministry.

"Scientific research that we are conducting down under in the southern ocean or in the northern pacific areas, we are doing it for research purposes and we are not doing it for food," he added. "(IWC) is supposed to regulate whaling, and be managing the whale stocks, not protecting all stocks of whales."

The IWC meeting, attended by some 80 countries, is focused on the body's inner workings rather than the big picture issues like debating continued whaling and suitable penalties, and some groups fear it will be much ado about nothing.

"There is a risk ... that by the end of the week, nothing substantial will have changed and it will be business as usual for the Japanese whalers," said Mick McIntyre, director of conservation group Whales Alive.

"Scientific whaling will continue to go on and in some ways the Japanese will walk away from here with everything that they already had," he added. "Whales are worth more alive than dead."

The meeting, the IWC's first in South America in 23 years, will run until Friday. (With reporting by Simon Gardner and Rodrigo Martinez in Santiago, Editing by Sandra Maler)

AlertNet news is provided by