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President Obama backs big cats
President Barack Obama is giving the big cats more protection in the wake of the notorious slaughter of Cecil the lion.
America
is upgrading the legal status of lions that will stop hunters from
trying to ship heads, claws and skins back home after a safari at a time
when numbers of the iconic animal are plunging.
There are fears the so-called King of the Beasts could vanish from the wild before the end of this century.
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Conservationists
say Americans are responsible for 60 per cent of all lion hunts in
Africa, but until now they have not needed a permit to bring home a lion
trophy they have killed overseas. The White
House's move to strengthen the US Endangered Species Act will not only
put two types of lion on a new legal footing but will also ban hunters
who have broken wildlife laws in the past from importing trophies..
If we do not act on this crisis now, lions could disappear from the wild in our lifetime
This will wound
hunters such as Cecil's killer Walter Palmer, the Minnesota dentist who
shot the black-maned lion with a bow and arrow during the summer. He
had pleaded guilty in 2008 to making false statements to the US Fish
and Wildlife Service about a black bear shot outside an authorised
hunting zone.
Officially, the Fish and Wildlife
Service are cautioning against linking the new orders with Cecil's
death, describing the action as a redoubling of efforts to ensure that
violators of wildlife laws do not benefit from importing wildlife
products.
Key to protecting lions is the way the
Obama administration has changed the animals' status under US law so
that one subspecies found in western and central parts of Africa and
genetically related to the Asiatic lion, numbering as few as 900
individuals, is now classed as endangered. This is the same footing as tigers, giant pandas and rhinos.
A second subspecies with a population as low as 17,000 animals and found in southern and eastern Africa is listed as threatened. In
short, this means a permit for importing a trophy or live animal for
the endangered lions will only be granted it aids survival.
For
threatened lions, the proviso for a permit is that any imports must
come from nations with sound conservation and use trophy hunting revenue
to sustain lion numbers and deter poaching.
British-based charity LionAid tonight welcomed the US moves. A
spokeswoman said: "The listing of African lions by the USFWS is a
welcome step forward for lion conservation. For the first time, lion
trophy hunting will be assessed as to whether it has a positive impact
on the conservation of the species.
AP
"Equally, it will not only be information from the lion range states that will be required: verification will be demanded. LionAid
believes that these stricter rules imposed on US trophy hunters, who
currently are responsible for over 60 per cent of African wild lion
hunts, will have a significant positive impact on lion populations which
have for far too long been hunted without due care to a species already
in catastrophic decline."
The African Wildlife Foundation also applauded Washington's measures. Dr.
Philip Muruthi, African Wildlife Foundation's vice president of species
protection, said: "This is a welcomed move by the US government and one
we hope will give some relief to Africa's lions, which face many
threats.
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AWF
chief executive Dr Patrick Bergin added: "We simply cannot afford
additional human-caused mortalities, which is why we are against the
sport hunting of lions. "A large percentage of
all lion trophies are imported into the US by American hunters. Both the
US government and American hunters have a responsibility to ensure
sport hunting does not negatively impact wildlife populations in
Africa."
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