Mountain gorillas face danger
2007-09-04 11:22
Nairobi - Highly endangered mountain gorillas in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo faced fresh dangers on Monday after renegade troops overran their habitat, forcing rangers to flee, conservationists warned.
Forces loyal to cashiered general Laurent Nkunda, a powerful local leader, attacked Jomba and Bikenge patrol posts in Virunga National Park, said Wildlife Direct in a statement.
It added that his troops looted weapons, ammunition and communication equipment, four days after a wildlife ranger was killed in another attack on a patrol post, north of Rushuru.
A third patrol post in Bukima was being evacuated pending an imminent attack, leaving the rare primates exposed to massacres that had already claimed several gorillas this year alone.
One ranger killed
Norbert Mushenzi of the Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature (ICCN), said: "If anything happens to the mountain gorillas now, there is nothing we can do.
"As of today the sector is no longer under my control and we have been rendered powerless by these actions."
Evacuated patrol posts lies nears the border of Uganda and Rwanda up to 100km north of Goma, the capital of Nord Kivu province. A patrol post in Rutshuru, where a ranger was killed last week, lies 50 km north of Goma.
Nine mountain gorillas had been killed and two still missing in Virunga national park since January. These slaughters, some blamed on Nkunda's men, had sparked outrage among conservationists.
After two were slaughtered and eaten in January, the renegade troops pledged to halt the killings in a meeting with Virunga park officials mediated by the United Nations and Congolese army.
Gorillas 'major tourist attraction'
The statement warned: "The area continues to see heightened political instability and rangers have been struggling to protect the mountain gorillas amid the threat of poachers and armed militia groups."
Local and foreign militias as well as Congolese soldiers, poachers and illegal miners regularly crossed this area of the Virunga park, one of Africa's largest national parks and a UNESCO world heritage site. Sometimes they occupied parts of it.
The mountain gorillas were a major tourist attraction in the Virunga park, but poaching of wildlife there was endemic.
Only about 700 critically endangered mountain gorillas remained in the wild, all of them living in the mountains of Rwanda, Uganda and the eastern DRC.
Nkunda's rebels and other armed groups were accused of poaching there and encroaching on their habitats.
Wildlife Direct chief Emmanuel de Merode warned that gorillas and rangers faced "enormous peril" in the park that sat in one of Africa's most volatile region, wracked by on-and-off conflicts for more than four decades.
He added: "They need our support even more now. We do not believe the rebels are specifically targeting the gorillas."