Some conservationists fighting back _ with guns

[Drizzt]

Some conservationists fighting back _ with guns
By JOAN LOWY
Scripps Howard News Service
December 17, 2002

- A small band of American conservationists has taken the extraordinary step of trying to arm and train a private militia to counter marauding gangs of poachers who are decimating wildlife and slaughtering villagers in a remote corner of Africa.

Dr. Bruce Hayse, a family physician from Jackson, Wyo., formed African Rainforest and Rivers Conservation after witnessing the human and ecological devastation wrought by poachers while on a rafting trip in the Central African Republic four years ago.

Hayse and his two companions, another doctor and an ecologist, were disturbed by the eerie absence of wildlife they observed while floating down the Chinko River, one of the world's wildest rivers.

Eventually, the Americans learned from Zanbe tribespeople in the village of Rafai that the surrounding forests had been wiped clear of wildlife by heavily armed gangs of Sudanese poachers who cross the border every year at the start of the six-month dry season, beginning in November, searching for any kind of animals they can find for the bushmeat trade.

The ecological damage and violence against villagers - rapes, beatings, murders, and forced labor - has steadily escalated over the past decade, but the impoverished Central African government has been unable to respond effectively, Hayse said.

"These people have no resources of their own, no way to fight back," Hayse said. "We realized we just couldn't do these great trips and look at this fascinating great country and just walk away and not do anything to help the people who live there."

On a return visit, the Americans met with the president of the central African nation, winning permission to help raise, arm and train a 400-person militia from villages in a 90,000-square mile region surrounding the drainage basin of the Chinko.

The Americans also recruited Dave Bryant, a former South African soldier with Special Forces training and experience routing poachers from wildlife preserves in other African countries.

Bryant uses an alias and refuses to have his picture taken because he has been threatened in the past by wildlife smugglers.

Sudanese poachers "come over the border armed like a standard Soviet infantry battalion," Bryant said. "They all have AK-47s (Russian assault rifles). They all carry at least five magazines, 300 rounds each."

The gangs are also often armed with rocket-propelled grenades and belt-feeding machineguns, Bryant said. The villagers, on the other hand, are usually armed with bows, arrows, spears and blowguns. Few, if any, have guns.

Last year, Bryant said he "sent out the word" through envoys and private meetings with gang leaders that the militia would soon begin fighting back. Three poacher leaders were captured. Two were released, a third was killed by villagers, he said.

This year, Bryant said he hopes to train villagers in guerilla warfare tactics, but the $250,000 raised by African Rainforest and Rivers Conservation - most of it donated by group's founders - isn't enough to arm the militia and support patrols with rations and other necessities.

African Rainforest and Rivers Conservation has approached numerous mainstream conservation groups for help but has been consistently rejected.

"Every time we approach the big conservation organizations like Conservation International, they just pee in their pants," Hayse said. "These people are sitting at their desks in Washington and are horrified at the prospect of actually have to defend this land, as opposed to having some government bureaucrat say they will defend it for them."

Officials for Conservation International declined to comment. Richard Carroll, director of African programs for the World Wildlife Fund, another international conservation group approach by Hayse, said in a prepared statement that security is the job of the national government and it would be a mistake for conservationists to become involved.

"We should help support government capacity to control their territory, but not replace them with private forces," Carroll said. "Ultimately, allowing a private militia run by expatriates to control the situation using lethal force against Africans will backfire on the government and hurt conservation in the region."

No conservation groups except African Rainforest and Rivers Conservation are currently operating in the eastern third of the Central African Republican because "the risk factor is too high," Bryant said.

"A lot of these organizations may criticize us, but in the background they are saying, 'We hope you succeed,' " Bryant said.


On the Net: African Rainforest and Rivers Conservation - www.africa-rainforest.org

http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story...2-17-02&cat=AN

[MissileMan]

Sounds like fun. Where does a bored former Marine sign up?

No conservation groups except African Rainforest and Rivers Conservation are currently operating in the eastern third of the Central African Republican because "the risk factor is too high," Bryant said.

Hmm. What about Green Knight Ltd?

[nualle]

Stunning news. Thanks for posting it, Drizzt.

It's a hard choice Hayse and his buddies are making. I'm not sure it's the right one. But it sure seems righter than doing nothing.

I just wonder if the poachers are allowed free access across the border by bribing gov't officials. If so, this could end very badly.

[thumbtack]

I wish more people did this.