A colonial attitude remains pervasive among those who defend the trophy hunting of elephants. They argue that ‘the west’ must stop lecturing Africans about how to manage their elephants. But it was Western hunters who shot elephants out to the point where they had to establish reserves, dispossessing and crowding out local communities in the […]
Tag: elephants
The appeal acquittal of Feisal Mohamed Ali: A victory for rule of law, a process corrupted, or both?
Could it have come at a worse time for Kenya’s Tourism and Wildlife Ministry? With Kenya still stinging from the humiliation and embarrassment over the translocation-related deaths of 11 rhinos, a Kenyan court declared on August 3 that convicted ivory trafficker Feisal Mohamed Ali was to be set free. Lady Justice Dora Chepkwony ruled that […]
Watching the largest herd of African Elephants in Amboseli National Park
While out on the safari drive in Amboseli National Park, we saw a huge cloud of dust in the distance. As the animals came closer, it became clear that this was probably the largest herd of African Elephants (as seen in the feature image) that we had seen here. It was also a herd with […]
POLL: Should trophy and big game hunting be banned?
Around 1.7m animal “trophies” have been exported across borders by hunters in the last decade, with at least 200,000 of them endangered species, according to a new report. US hunters are by far the largest killers of trophy animals, including half of all the 11,000 lions shot in the last decade, the report found. The […]
Will 2016 Be a Breakthrough in the Fight to Save Elephants?
Just outside Arusha High Court in northern Tanzania one morning in November, the five men waited for the magistrate to call their names. All had been charged with killing elephants. This was the fourth preliminary hearing for a suspected head poacher and his accomplices since their arraignment more than a year ago. The younger ones […]
POLL: Should Japan be sanctioned for fueling the slaughter of elephants?
Before Chinese demand for ivory began driving the black market and illegal killing of tens of thousands of elephants each year, it was Japan’s market for hanko, personal seals used to sign contracts, that fueled the ivory trade. For at least a thousand years, they’ve been made in Japan out of a variety of materials. […]
Elephants massacred for ivory in Central African Republic
Dozens of elephants have been slaughtered in the Dzanga Bai World Heritage Site in the Central African Republic just days after conservationists warned about an impending threat from the movement of 17 heavily armed poachers. The massacre occurred at a site renowned as “village of elephants”, where tourists and scientists have for decades observed wild […]