The article articulates the illicit trade in natural resources in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe has been surreptitiously bartering tons of ivory with China, in return for military hardware amid reports the State has been systematically pillaging natural resources and poaching endangered elephants to enrich a few ruling elite. Details of the illicit operation emerged as the 171-member Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) relaxed its regulations in Geneva last allowing four African countries, including Zimbabwe, to put their ivory stocks on the market in a one-time sale. Zimbabwe’s tourist literature makes great play of a supposedly rising elephant population, but experts believe the figures have been distorted as part of an attempt by the regime to make CITES relax its ivory trading rules. The Zimbabwean government blamed much of the carnage on foreign animal rights groups, which it claimed were trying to thwart Mugabe’s bid to have the CITES rules relaxed. Experts claim more than 200 elephants have been killed over the past year alone.
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