AFRICA'S WESTERN BLACK RHINO OFFICIALLY DECLARED EXTINCT

Poaching of rhinos is fueled by Asian market demand.  Asians use rhino parts for traditional medicine.  The actual poaching is done by highly organized gangs.  

The same Asian belief in animal medicinal attributes is also driving tiger populations to extinction. 

And the Asian ivory market is behind the frequent massacres of elephants who are killed only for their tusks.

 

Africa’s western black rhino is now officially extinct according the latest review of animals and plants by the world’s largest conservation network.

 

The subspecies of the black rhino — which is classified as “critically endangered” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species — was last seen in western Africa in 2006.

 

The IUCN warns that other rhinos could follow saying Africa’s northern white rhino is “teetering on the brink of extinction” while Asia’s Javan rhino is “making its last stand” due to continued poaching and lack of conservation.

 

“In the case of the western black rhino and the northern white rhino the situation could have had very different results if the suggested conservation measures had been implemented,” Simon Stuart, chair of the IUCN species survival commission said in a statement.

Read more - http://science.time.com/2013/11/06/western-black-rhino-declared-extinct/

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November 2013:  British Paratroopers in Kenya to train local rangers who are battling against increasingly militarised poachers. 
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/01/british-army-elephant-rhino-poaching-kenya


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