The "Tokyo Two", as the environmental group calls them, face up to 10 years in prison if convicted in the trial, which started Monday and according to Greenpeace "bears all the hallmarks of a political prosecution".

Japanese whalers kill hundreds of the sea mammals every year in Antarctic waters. They have repeatedly clashed in recent weeks with militant environmental activists of the Sea Shepherd society.

Commercial whaling has been banned worldwide since 1986, but Japan justifies its annual hunts as "lethal scientific research", while not hiding the fact that the meat is later sold in shops and restaurants.

Greenpeace says its investigation showed that whale meat from the state-funded expeditions has also been embezzled, with parcels of salted whale meat being sent to crew members for personal consumption or sale.

The activists, Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki, have not denied taking a 23.5 kilogram (about 50 pound) box of whale meat in 2008 from a delivery service depot in Aomori. They later presented it as evidence to state prosecutors.

"It was an attempt to make an illegal sale of whale meat public, and the meat was not obtained for my personal consumption or resale," Sato, 33, told the Aomori District Court, the Kyodo news agency reported.

In a link posted Monday on micro-blogging website Twitter, Sato said that the Greenpeace investigation had started with a tip-off from a whistleblower, a former whaler who said he was angered by widespread embezzlement.

"When insider information is brought to non-government organisations and other third parties, I believe the freedom to investigate it should be guaranteed," Sato wrote.

"A society that protects its citizens' actions to blow the whistle against wrongdoing leads to a democratic society that puts its citizens at its core."

In May 2008 the activists took the box to the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors' Office, which launched a graft investigation.

They dropped the probe, concluding that the whale meat was a standard bonus for crew, on June 20 -- the same day police arrested the Greenpeace activists.

Sato and Suzuki were held in police custody for the maximum period of 23 days, during which they say they were interrogated for a total of 200 hours between them, often tied to their chairs and without lawyers present.

More than 70 police also raided the Greenpeace offices in Tokyo and the homes of four of its staff members, the group said, with officers confiscating computer servers and documents, amid heavy media coverage.

"We believe this is clearly a political trial, and the UN has opined that the two were arbitrarily detained," said Greenpeace spokesman Greg McNevin.

The UN Human Rights Commission's Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has said that Japan breached several articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in its case against the two activists.

The Greenpeace members had "acted considering that their actions were in the greater public interest as they sought to expose criminal embezzlement within the tax-payer-funded whaling industry," the UN body said.

The hearing was adjourned until March 8.

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