Month: July 2023

The United States is helping find wildlife criminals and bring them to justice through international cooperation, communication and coordination.

Wildlife Enforcement Networks (WENs) around the world work to reduce nature crimes and protect animals everywhere.

“We have come a long way in improving our capacity to detect and interdict trafficked wildlife and fight nature crime,” said Monica Medina, the assistant secretary of state for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs (OES) and special envoy for Biodiversity and Water Resources, after the November 2022 Fourth Global Meeting of WENs, which was supported by OES. “There are numerous examples of cases where transboundary cooperation resulted in seizures and arrests, not to mention successful investigations and prosecutions.”

The International Consortium on Combating Wildlife Crime (ICCWC) — the group that hosts the global meeting — defines wildlife as all wild fauna and flora. Fauna includes animals such as birds and fish, while flora includes timber and non-timber forest products. Wildlife crime includes taking, possessing and trading wild fauna and flora against national or international law.

In 2022, the ICCWC partners, including Interpol, the World Customs Organization and the World Bank, worked with countries’ law enforcement to stop wildlife trafficking in 125 countries around the globe.

Authorities identified 934 wildlife trafficking suspects, along with 2,200 seizures of wildlife products — including 119 big cats, 34 primates, 750 birds and 1,795 reptiles.

Over the past two years, the United States has worked especially closely with the South American Wildlife Enforcement Network (SudWEN) to prevent wildlife trafficking in the Western Hemisphere.

Collaborative efforts include:

• The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Office of Law Enforcement sending wildlife law enforcement attachés in American embassies in Peru and Brazil to work with local law enforcement agencies to focus on wildlife trafficking.
• U.S. Agency for International Development continuing to work with the United Nations on the Combating Transnational Conservation Crimes in the Amazon project.
• The United States working closely with ICCWC partners and SudWEN countries to strengthen SudWEN’s ability to coordinate regional efforts to stop wildlife crime, including providing technical expertise and supporting law enforcement.

“We have to work together to halt these terrible crimes and the risk they pose to our security, people, and the planet,” Medina said.

La Reserva Biopark houses and rehabilitates various animals in danger of extinction in Colombia, which have been victims of illegal trafficking and have ended up with deep wounds on their bodies. Learn about the initiatives that exist to protect and reproduce these animals, which are on the brink of extinction in the world.

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — On the outskirts of Colombia’s capital red macaws share a nature reserve with ocelots and black-headed parrots. A white-crested harpy eagle whistles at schoolchildren who walk on a well-preserved trail.

The animals come from different regions of this ecologically diverse South American country. But most of them share one thing in common: They were rescued from animal traffickers.

As leaders in the fight against wildlife trafficking gather in London this week at the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference, conservationists around the world are working to provide shelters to the thousands of animals that have been rescued from smugglers.

The Bio Parque La Reserva in the Colombian city of Cota is home to 50 species ranging from turtles to golden poison frogs, which are sought by collectors for their rare color.

Ivan Lozano, the reserve’s director, said his organization helps formerly trafficked animals recover from their injuries and reintroduces some of them into the wild. But it also uses animals that can no longer live in their original habitats to teach visitors about different species and their role in the ecosystem.

“Our idea here is to change the behavior of younger generations toward these animals” Lozano said.

To achieve this goal the Bioparque reserve opens its doors to hundreds of tourists and schoolchildren each week, for a fee of $6. Only guided visits led by the park’s experts are allowed.

While Colombia lacks well-known species like rhinos or elephants that make world animal-trafficking headlines, the country is strongly affected by the trafficking of exotic snakes, parrots, frogs and three-toed sloths.

More than 23,000 animals were confiscated in Colombia from traffickers last year, and smuggling is a serious threat to species like the golden poison frog.

Lozano believes that education is one of the keys to reducing animal trafficking and that is why he has opened his reserve to visitors.

“We want people to realize that they too have a role in reducing the loss of our biodiversity” he said. “And we want to make scientific discourse more accessible.”