MOSCOW—Russia on Monday, April 8, signed an agreement with a group of international scientists to free nearly 100 whales that have been held for months in cramped pens in Russia’s Far East, a scandal that has triggered a wave of criticism.
Images of the 10 orcas and 87 beluga whales, kept in enclosures in a bay near the Sea of Japan port of Nakhodka, first appeared after they were caught last summer by firms which planned to sell them to marine parks or aquariums in China.
