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| Alain Pons/PhotoAlto |
| Tusks may be traded for weapons. |
There’s an emerging twist to the trade in illegal wildlife and this time it involves much more than the jeopardizing of the planet’s plants and animals. This trade is increasingly linked with some of the most notorious villainies of the new century. Wild animals, especially endangered species, are being dubbed “the new blood diamonds” as their capture, slaughter, and trade around the world feeds money into the wallets of criminals.
One Kind of Crime Begets Another
China is the number one importer of wildlife, and the United States is a close second. In these countries, and elsewhere worldwide, many people find it easy to turn a blind eye to the negative effects of international trade on wildlife populations. What they don’t know, however, is that the hefty price they pay for exotic animals and their parts could be funding violence, murder, civil wars and drug smuggling in troubled countries.
A Congressional Research Association investigation recently showed that many of the same criminals who deal weapons and drugs are also hawking wildlife. The report stated that even some insurgent groups and possibly terrorist groups are involved in illegal poaching for profit in several areas of Asia and Africa. Additionally, many lawbreakers prosecuted for trade crimes have previous convictions for drugs, violence, theft and firearms offenses. Some of the kinds of crimes and violence that the wildlife trade is funding are truly shocking.
Animal and Human Victims
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| Copyright Veer |
| Fur pelts may hide drugs. |
Perhaps the most notorious of recent pillagers of wildlife are the Janjaweed who has carried out the genocide attacks in Darfur. Last year, several Janjaweed militiamen killed three park rangers in Chad in their attempt to swipe 1.5 tons of African elephant ivory, worth about U.S. $1.3 million, that Chadian officials had seized from poachers over the years. According to local authorities, the Janjaweed have slaughtered hundreds of elephants in Chad’s Zakouma National Park. The animals’ ivory tusks are then shipped off to Asia or traded for weapons. The fact that the Janjaweed are using money from wild animal trade to fund genocide demonstrates how such trade is not only harmful to the species involved but also for the people who become more victims of the traders.
Drug trafficking is known as a domain of many organized crime groups. How this links to the wildlife trade, however, hasn’t been common knowledge. The international trade in wild animals has become an easy way of living for many criminals, whether they use the money from trade to fund their drug operations or use the wildlife itself to transport their goods. Drugs are known to have been hidden among animal skins and even in live animals. There are records of parrots being sent from Bolivia to the Netherlands stuffed with pure cocaine. Live animals or animal parts are also often traded for drugs. The fact is, the immoral elements already at work in drug trafficking make it easy for criminals to move into the lucrative wildlife trade market.
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Solving the Problem
One may wonder how this appalling problem is able to continue as it does. While the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) has made significant progress in regulating the legal wildlife trade, criminals don’t care about the law. Even when arrests occur, most involve poor small-time poachers, while the big traffickers escape undetected. Major criminal groups have the funds to develop advanced trafficking techniques and to avoid capture of their leaders.
The illegal trade in wild animals is bad enough, but the fact that this abominable business is also funding some of the most dangerous and despicable criminal acts of our time demonstrates the importance of consumers’ avoiding buying wildlife products.
