Five rangers murdered fighting to protect mountain gorillas

The shocking ambush of the five wildlife guardians along with their driver means that 175 rangers have now lost their lives fighting to save gorillas in the famous Virunga National Park.

Congo’s notorious Mai-Mai — a militia known for their beliefs in magic — are being blamed for the atrocity, firing on the team of Virunga rangers, all under the age of 30, as they were

travelling to their base on the Ugandan border. Virunga, Africa’s oldest national park, has been gripped by armed conflict for decades, with dozens of foreign and domestic militia fighting

over its precious reserves of timber, gold, diamonds and minerals, such as coltan, which is used in mobile telephones. The park is also home to around half the world’s remaining 900 mountain

gorillas who have also paid a heavy price from poachers’ bullets during the conflict. Only the bravery of its rangers have seen gorilla numbers continue to increase after decades of

violence. Shortly before news of the rangers’ murders was released by the DRC authorities, a new report on Africa’s continuing armed struggles and their impacts on wildlife was being

published by researchers from the Zoological Society of London. A recent surge in fighting across Africa’s arid Sahara-Sahel region is having a “catastrophic impact” on the region’s wild

creatures, warns the study, with elephants along with rare antelopes and gazelle suffering dramatic losses. Cheetahs, stolen from the wild to become pets in the Middle East, are also

threatened. Extremist groups such as Boko Haram and Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb have flamed increasing conflict across the region – spread across Algeria, Libya and Egypt in the north to

Nigeria, Chad and Mali in the south – since the Arab Spring of 2011. Remote areas once precious refuges for wildlife have increasingly become battlegrounds in the ongoing struggles for

territorial control. The presence of well-armed fighters has meant a sharp rise in wild animals being killed illegally for their meat, for sport or for trafficking. Researchers says across

the Sahara-Sahel’s southern regions, where the fighting has persisted longest, its megafauna have now been almost completely wiped out. Studies centred on three species – dorcas gazelle,

addax antelope and African elephant – to illustrate how escalating conflict contributes to wildlife population decline and increased killing, while the rise in fighting has also been a key

factor in seven other species being reduced. ZSL scientists worked with the Portugese conservation organisation CIBIO-InBIO on the report, published in Conservation Letters, and which calls

on the international community to help communities protect their natural resources and livelihoods at times of conflict. Lead author José Carlos Brito, a researcher at CIBIO-InBIO said:

"The recent increase in armed conflicts emphasises the need to identify areas where wildlife is declining and to develop effective policies to reduce the impacts of these conflicts on

biodiversity." Co-author and global authority on cheetah, Dr Sarah Durant from ZSL’s Institute of Zoology, added: “As if the harsh, arid landscape isn’t enough, the growth of armed

conflict in the Sahara-Sahel region is yet another serious threat that wildlife in this critical region now have to contend with. “Cheetahs, in their position at the top of the food chain,

are particularly vulnerable to the multiple threats in the region. "Unless prompt action is taken, the unique biodiversity of the Sahara-Sahel could be lost forever.”