Month: April 2022

A blindfold calms the large black and white augur buzzard as two men glue a prosthetic leg into an insert on her body to replace the one that she lost.

 

The female is one of many injured birds of prey that turn up at Simon Thomsett’s Kenyan rehabilitation center, most of which, like her, have been crippled by electrocution.

 

The problem has progressively grown as Kenya has upgraded its electricity network, replacing wooden poles with steel-reinforced concrete, which can be conductive, and hanging inadequately insulated power lines between them, conservationists say.

 

That and the lack of deterrent markers along the cables are pushing Kenya’s already dwindling bird of prey populations closer to disappearance.

 

“Thirty years ago, the birds were coming in being hit by cars, diseased… or hitting things like clothes lines or …windows,” said Thomsett before/after helping to fit the prosthetic.

 

“Now we … the vast majority is electrocution.”

 

Many are killed outright by the shock, both via direct collision with power lines or from perching.

Kenya’s population of augur buzzards, historically one of its most common birds of prey has plunged 91% over 40 years due to electrocution, habitat loss, and poisoning, according to a February study by Thomsett and others published in Biological Conservation.

Over the same period, hooded vulture are down 88% and long-crested eagles by 94%, the study said.

The government-run Kenya Power and Lighting Company did not respond to requests for comment.

In some parts of South Africa, bird flight diverters have successfully been introduced to reduce instances of such deaths.

“These devices can reduce collisions by over 90% for some species,” said Lourens Leeuwner, who manages the wildlife and energy program at South Africa’s Endangered Wildlife Trust.

 

Source: Voice of America

GABORONE, BOTSWANA — The Botswana Wildlife Producers Association, a group that focuses on the conservation and management of the country’s wildlife, says placing electronic tracking collars on big tusk elephants could help prevent indiscriminate hunts. The idea follows the recent killing of a so-called big tusker during a sanctioned hunt, which sparked outrage among conservationists.

 

The association’s chief executive, Isaac Theophilus, said while his organization is satisfied that the hunt of bull elephants is being handled properly, tracking some big tusk elephants could help.

 

An electronic elephant collar helps keep track of the animal so that unsanctioned hunts of these animals for their tusks can be prevented.

 

“The hunt from the point of view of the association is that it was perfectly legal,” Theophilus said. “We are happy with the size of the trophy that was harvested, and we are glad we still have such big tuskers. Going forward, the association would like to work hand-in-hand with [the] government to ensure that we monitor elephant populations out there. Go out there and collar a few of the so-called big tuskers and follow them to ensure that they are not harvested or anything like [that].”

 

Theophilus contended the criticism of Botswana’s decision to reintroduce hunting in 2019 is unjustified. The southern African country recently opened its annual hunting season, which ends in September.

 

“The issue might have attracted criticism from certain quarters that do not value Botswana’s conservation efforts,” he said. “This particular hunt is a very good tusker. We should as a country be very appreciative that our conservation efforts are bearing fruit. We still have big elephants in the conservation areas, particularly in the concession areas and in the parks, where no hunting is done.”

 

Local professional hunter Randy Motsumi said hunters always target old bulls with big tusks, which is what their clients demand.

 

“Mostly the hunters are looking for big bulls, which are old and no longer breeding,” Motsumi said. “If natural death could have occurred, who would have benefited? No one would have benefited. The animal was going to rot in the bush. Now hunters have shot a bull and it has fed more than 700 people. There is money in the government coffers and the community got employed. All these people have gained from only one big elephant that is no longer breeding.”

 

Conservationist Map Ives said shooting big elephants is what drives the hunting industry.

 

“It is truly an impressive elephant, and the hunting of large tusks elephant is very much at the core of what the hunting industry is selling to its customer base in the United States in particular,” Ives said. “That is what the professional hunting industry is all about; is to find the biggest, largest animal because they have lists and books of records, and everybody wants to be in that book of records and publish a story about him.”

 

Among critics of the decision to gun down a big tusk elephant is British Conservative Party Member of Parliament Roger Gale. He argued that tourists pay for photographic safaris to see the big tuskers, and he is opposed to Botswana’s decision to reintroduce trophy hunting.

 

But Botswana government spokesperson William Sentshebeng says Gale seeks to undermine Botswana’s pragmatic and sustainable conservation policy.

 

While elephant populations are declining elsewhere on the continent, Botswana has seen its herd grow to more than 130,000, while the most it can support is estimated at 55,000.

 

Source: Voice of America

UNITED NATIONS, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will begin a “Ramadan solidarity visit” on Saturday to Senegal, Niger and Nigeria, said his deputy spokesman.

 

Guterres will meet and share an Iftar dinner with President Macky Sall of Senegal, who assumed the presidency of the African Union earlier this year. He will also take part in Eid celebrations with President Mohamed Bazoum of Niger and he is scheduled to meet President Muhammadu Buhari of Nigeria, said Farhan Haq, the deputy spokesman.

 

Monday is Eid al-Fitr, a religious holiday at the end of the holy month of Ramadan that is celebrated by Muslims worldwide.

 

In the three countries, Guterres will have meetings with senior government officials as well as civil society representatives, including women, youth groups and religious leaders. He will meet families deeply affected by violence and instability in the Sahel, including people internally displaced and refugees, said Haq.

 

The UN chief will also see first-hand the impact of climate change on vulnerable communities and will assess progress and challenges to the COVID-19 recovery, he said.

 

Guterres began annual Ramadan solidarity visits when he was UN High Commissioner for Refugees. He is resuming this tradition, which was interrupted by COVID-19.

 

The Africa trip follows his visits to Moscow and Kiev to push for peace in Ukraine. Guterres met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow and with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kiev.

 

Source: Nam News Network

BANJUI, Rebels have killed at least six soldiers in an attack on a military outpost in southeast Central African Republic, the latest reported incident in a decade-long conflict, a local official and a hospital director have said.

 

Members of an alliance of armed groups known as the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC) assaulted a military camp on the outskirts of Bakouma town early on Thursday morning, said a local government official who did not wish to be named for security reasons.

 

Six soldiers and four rebels were killed, he said.

The attack was confirmed by the head of a hospital in the nearby city of Bangassou, also on condition of anonymity, where bodies and wounded soldiers were taken.

 

Mineral-rich Central African Republic has been mired in violence since a coalition of mainly Muslim Seleka rebels deposed then-President Francois Bozize in 2013, sparking reprisals from mostly Christian militias.

 

In recent years the army, backed by United Nations peacekeepers, Russian and Rwandan troops – has been battling CPC fighters seeking to overturn the outcome of an election in December 2020 that saw President Faustin-Archange Touadéra clinch a second term.

 

The UN has accused all parties of abuses including summary killings, torture, conflict-related sexual violence and the use of child fighters among others.

 

It has lost more than 160 peacekeepers in a conflict that has displaced more than one million people.

 

A Special Criminal Court set up in 2015 to prosecute war crimes committed in the country kicked off its first trial last week.

 

Source: Nam News Network