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In January 2021, Nigeria seized pangolin scales and tusks and bones from endangered species hidden in a container of furniture materials. The seized materials are used in traditional Chinese medicine despite having no medicinal value. Studies have suggested that pangolins, the most-smuggled animals in the world, may have been an intermediate host of the coronavirus that was discovered in an outdoor farmers market in Wuhan, China, in late 2019. Customs officials said the contraband consisted of 162 sacks of pangolin scales and 57 sacks of mixed animal parts, including ivory and…

Seven new wildlife crime cases have been reported recently, while 21 suspects were arrested. Seven suspects were arrested with regards to rhino poaching or trafficking cases and six were arrested for elephant poaching or trafficking. At Oshikango, two Namibians and three Angolan nationals were arrested on 5 December for being in the possession of a pangolin skin. In another incident at Okakarara, five Namibians were arrested on 5 December for conspiring to hunt a rhino.

The US on Monday announced visa restrictions on eight DR Congo nationals involved in wildlife trafficking, in the latest whip on supposed illegal revenues fuelling conflict in the central African nation. The eight people, believed to be connected business and political players in the country, are accused of having a hand in trafficking of ivory, pangolin scales and rhino horn; products of endangered species.

The department of forestry, fisheries and the environment has confirmed that 24 rhinos carcasses have been found in South Africa since the beginning of December.

Am vergangen Sonntag wurden zwei Verdächtige festgenommen, die im Oktober 2020 ein Nashorn gewildert haben sollen. Das geht aus einem Bericht des Umweltministeriums hervor. Den beiden Männern wird vorgeworfen, ein unter Artenschutz stehendes Nashorn gejagt, getötet sowie den Kadaver verkauft zu haben. Darüber hinaus wurden in der letzten Woche sechs weitere neue Fälle in Verbindung mit Wildtierkriminalität bekannt. Insgesamt 21 Personen wurden festgenommen. Darunter fallen eine Vielzahl an Personen, die im illegalen Besitz von Wildtierprodukten waren und damit Handel betrieben…

Cape Town - Four suspects were arrested by police for the poaching of five rhinos at a private game reserve. Police spokesperson Wesley Twiggs said the four arrested suspects were expected to appear in Ceres Magistrate’s Court after they have been charged. Five rhinos were attacked by poachers at Inverdoorn Private Game Reserve just outside Cape Town last week. Four of the rhinos were killed while the fifth rhino survived a gunshot to the face.

The South African National Parks (SANParks) warned people on Saturday about a video circulating on social media depicting a "severely injured White Rhino cow", saying it was "distressing to watch". In a statement, SANParks said that its rhino dehorning team made the gruesome discovery of a badly mutilated female rhino in the South of the Kruger National Park (KNP) on Thursday. "According to the SANParks Veterinarian and the Section Ranger who attended to the rhino, it appeared as if the animal had been shot a few days prior to being found.

Four rhino have been killed at a game reserve just outside of Cape Town. Management at the Inverdoorn private game reserve said that an anti-poaching unit found the four rhino while on their regular patrols. One of the four was pregnant. A fifth rhino was wounded and is recovering.

Inverdoorn Private Game Reserve - Searl Derman, owner of Inverdoorn Private Game Reserve, just outside of Cape Town in the Western Cape, South Africa, and his management and staff are left traumatised after four rhinos, (including one pregnant female) were found massacred last night (Wednesday 08 December 2021). At approximately 22h30 the 24 hour Anti-Poaching Unit raised the alarm as they found the horrific scene of four shot rhino while on their regular patrols.

A rhino horn trader has been sentenced to 14 years in jail, the longest ever prison term a Vietnamese court has handed down for the crime, a local conservation group said on Wednesday. Vietnam is both a consumption hub and popular transit point for the multi-billion-dollar trade in animal parts. Authorities have long vowed to stem the flow of illegal wildlife crisis-crossing its borders, but experts have warned the black market persists thanks to weak law enforcement.

One of the seven Chinese nationals who slipped out of the country while on bail after being arraigned on charges of money laundering and possession of more than 20 kilogrammes of rhino horns has been arrested by the International Criminal Police Organisation (Interpol) in the United Arab Emirates after spending over two years on the run.

The continued refusal by the government of Botswana to allow game rangers to carry firearms, coupled with the country's secrecy on poaching statistics and other wildlife data, is baffling conservationists. On 25 September, as Botswana marked a belated World Rhino Day, former president Ian Khama - a renowned wildlife conservationist - took to his Facebook page to share his thoughts.

South Africa is no stranger to wildlife crime as shown in Operation Thunder, an Interpol-led effort against environmental crime in the broadest sense of the words. The worldwide enforcement operation against wildlife and timber crime co-ordinated by Interpol and the World Customs Organisation (WCO) disrupted crime networks and saw hundreds of arrests internationally, the France-headquartered policing body said.

Shocking official statistics have emerged which show that the world's single-largest population of rhinos - those living in the flagship Kruger National Park - has been slashed by between 66% and 70% over the past decade, mainly due to the unrelenting wave of butchery by international hornpoaching syndicates.

Authorities put the value of the seizure at N952million and say the items were headed to Vietnam. Mohammed Abba-Kura, Customs Comptroller, said at a media briefing on Tuesday in Lagos that the items were contained in a one-unit 20-feet container with number CSLU 2362640 heading to Haiphong, Vietnam. He said the items, falsely declared as furniture, comprised 162 sacks of pangolin scales weighing 8,800kg and 57 sacks of mixed endangered species of various sizes such as ivory/animal horns, lion bones and others.

Measures to help curb the spread of Covid-19 in Uganda - such as restrictions on movement - apparently have not deterred the illegal international wildlife trade. The demand for both traditional wildlife products (such as pangolin scales) and newer ones (such as elephant penises) has continued, with numerous arrests made last year. There was an increase in poaching in Queen Elizabeth National Park, Uganda’s top wildlife reserve, with 60 poachers arrested between March and May 2020.

It reveals how some offenders identified the Zambezi Region, which lies within the Kavango-Zambezi Trans-Frontier Conservation Area (KAZA TFCA), as the local hub for trading of wildlife products. Kongola, Rundu, and Windhoek were also implicated as local locations for transit or sale of wildlife products, while Bwabwata, Mudumu, Nkasa Rupara, and Etosha National Parks were identified as the sources for elephant, lion, and rhino products.

Prosecutor general Martha Imalwa has decided to only prosecute self-proclaimed preacher Jackson Babi for his alleged attempt to bribe investigating officers last year following his arrest on charges stemming from the possession of two rhino horns, a firearm and ammunition without a valid licence.

A Kenyan man accused in a multimillion-dollar operation to deal rhinoceros horns and ivory from elephant tusks - harming more than 100 endangered animals - arrived in the city Monday morning after being extradited to face charges of conspiracy to commit wildlife trafcking and other counts.

Three black rhinos were found killed in separate incidents in the Lephalale and Gravelotte policing areas. In the first incident, a rhino was found shot and killed at a local game reserve in the Waterberg district on Friday, 22 January.

A 36-year-old man appeared at the Kempton Park Regional Court on Monday, 18 January, after being arrested for illegal dealing in rhino horns. Kelvin Chigwede - who was arrested on Saturday - was charged for illegal dealing in rhino horns and contravention of the National Environmental Biodiversity Act (NEMBA) according to Hawks’ spokesperson Captain Ndivhuwo Mulamu.

Ses vermeende renosterstropers is vasgetrek en bly in aanhouding nadat 'n witrenosterbul in die Okahandja-distrik gestroop is. Volgens die hoof van die Blue Rhino-taakspan, komm. Barry de Klerk, is die karkas van die bul met sy horings verwyder omstreeks 07:30 op Vrydag 8 Januarie op 'n private wildreservaat gevind. Hy het bevestig dit is die eerste renoster wat vanjaar in Namibië gestroop is.

Rhino horns weighing more than 70kg were discovered in chicken food mixture in a warehouse in Kempton Park in December. The Hawks arrested a 36-year-old man in Gauteng at the weekend for being a suspected rhino horn dealer.

Sechs mutmaßliche Nashornwilderer wurden festgenommen, nachdem vor zehn Tagen im Bezirk Okahandja ein Breitmaulnashornbulle gewildert worden war. Nach der Bekanntgabe der Nachricht am vergangenen Freitag gab der Leiter der Blue Rhino Task Force, Barry de Klerk, an, dass der Kadaver des Tiers - ohne Nasenhörner - eine Woche zuvor in einem privaten Wildreservat gefunden worden war.

Sechs mutmaßliche Nashornwilderer wurden festgenommen, nachdem vor zehn Tagen im Bezirk Okahandja ein Breitmaulnashornbulle gewildert worden war. Nach der Bekanntgabe der Nachricht am vergangenen Freitag gab der Leiter der Blue Rhino Task Force, Barry de Klerk, an, dass der Kadaver des Tiers - ohne Nasenhörner - eine Woche zuvor in einem privaten Wildreservat gefunden worden war.

Zimbabwean police officer Sergeant Tawanda Kwaramba drove from Bulawayo to Victoria Falls on September 16 2019, on a mission to undermine the law he had sworn to uphold. In Victoria Falls he loaded seven Chinese nationals into a stolen car and drove more than 900km to Sango on the border with Mozambique. From Sango border post, the Chinese nationals - Zeng Dengui, Peicon Jang, Liu Cheng, Yu Xian, Yong Zhiu, Cheng Zhiang and Qui Jinchang - were driven across south-central Mozambique to Maputo and the safety of a Chinese fishing boat that was due to sail them home.

Ses vermeende renosterstropers is vasgetrek nadat 'n witrenosterbul verlede week in die Okahandja-distrik gestroop is. Volgens die hoof van die Blue Rhino-taakspan, komm. Barry de Klerk, is die karkas van die bul met sy horings verwyder omstreeks 07:30 op Vrydag, 8 Januarie op 'n private wildreservaat gevind.

Six men suspected of rhino poaching have been arrested after a white rhino bull was poached in the Okahandja district last week. According to the head of the Blue Rhino task team, Commissioner Barry de Klerk, the carcass of the bull - with its horns removed - was discovered around 07h30 on a private game reserve."Detectives from the task force and the protected species unit of the Namibian police launched an intelligence-driven investigation last Saturday. During a secret operation, two suspects, Jeff Makayi Nadango (36) and Stefanus Muyenga Musore (49), were…

Namibia saw a continued downward trend in rhino and elephant poaching last year after stepping up patrols and sharply increasing nes, the government said on Thursday. Citing intensied intelligence operations by authorities and collaboration between the government and the private sector, environment ministry spokesman Romeo Muyunda said 30 rhinos had been poached last year compared with 50 in 2019 and 79 in 2018. Only 11 elephants were poached in 2020 compared with 13 a year earlier.

Namibia saw a continued downward trend in rhino and elephant poaching last year after stepping up patrols and sharply increasing fines, the government said on Thursday. Citing intensified intelligence operations by authorities and collaboration between the government and the private sector, environment ministry spokesperson Romeo Muyunda said 30 rhinos had been poached last year compared with 50 in 2019 and 79 in 2018. Only 11 elephants were lost to poachers in 2020 compared with 13 a year earlier.

Commercial and subsistence poaching in protected areas is on the rise. The extent of loss sustained by Namibia on account of the Illegal Wildlife Trade (IWT) is not reliably quantified (Anon., 2017). Wildlife populations for some of Namibia’s most iconic species - African Elephant Loxodonta africana, and Black Rhinoceros Diceros bicornis - are currently under threat due to IWT, and increased poaching in recent years is damaging their otherwise healthy populations.