Ivory and Terror: Fact or Myth?

[Toko]

From TRAFFIC Bulletin Vol. 27 No. 2 (2015) http://www.traffic.org/traffic-bulletin ... n_27_2.pdf

Ivory and Terror: Fact or Myth?

The illegal wildlife trade, and the poaching
which feeds it, has in some places reached
unprecedented levels. With increased
attention being given to this issue at the
highest levels of government, and its
impact on broader issues such as rule of
law and security, there has been growing speculation that
the high profits from this trade—particularly the ivory
trade—is financing the operations of terrorist networks.
Immediately following the Westgate Mall killings in
Nairobi in September 2013, where gunmen from the
terrorist group al-Shabaab killed at least 67 people, some
media and organizations seized upon the claim from a
little-known report Africa’s White Gold of Jihad, that
40% of the terror group al-Shabaab’s operational budget
came from moving 1–3 tonnes of ivory through Somalia
every month. Since then, well-known organizations have
mounted public campaigns using this terror and ivory
theme, promoting the direct connection between ivory
trade and terrorism.
The Royal United Services Institute for Defence
and Security Studies (RUSI), a British defence and
security think tank, last September released a report that
attempted to examine the evidence for these widespread
claims, particularly in relation to the role of al-Shabaab.
Using extensive surveys, desk-based research and
fieldwork in Nairobi and Kenya, the report, An Illusion
of Complicity: Terrorism and the Illegal Ivory Trade in
East Africa, concluded that the claim that al-Shabaab
receives up to 40% of its running costs through the illegal
ivory trade alone is largely wrong. It noted that available
data (including from the Elephant Trade Information
System managed by TRAFFIC) showed that only small
amounts of ivory appear to have moved through Somalia
during the current poaching crisis—far smaller than the
volumes transiting Kenyan and Tanzanian ports. Any
small benefit al-Shabaab may derive from this trade is
apparently significantly dwarfed by its main sources of
funds—smuggling of charcoal and sugar. The al-Shabaab
income from charcoal trade is previously documented
consistently and widely accepted by the institutions with
expertise in al-Shabaab’s operations.
The report, in fact, concludes that the main drivers
of illegal ivory trade across East Africa are not terrorist
networks but highly networked organized crime groups,
brokers and corrupt government officials and warns that
the ivory-terrorism narrative serves as nothing more
than a distraction from the international community’s
efforts to tackle these groups. The report also warned
that the current bias towards militarized anti-poaching
operations in some areas of East Africa needs to be
addressed, and that aggressive front-line activities need
to be complemented by community-engagement and
development programmes.
The militarization of poaching was the subject of a
Roundtable Meeting organized by RUSI and the Global
Initiative against Transnational Organized Crime in the
UK in October 2015. Organized crime and anti-poaching
experts at the meeting noted that teams of poachers from
African countries like Mozambique were often wellarmed
with high-calibre hunting rifles and automatic
weapons, night vision goggles and GPS equipment. In
comparison, it seems that most African rangers employed
to protect wildlife are considered under-paid, undertrained
and under-resourced, and are putting their lives
in danger on a daily basis. One participant stressed
the phrase ‘‘professionalization, not militarization”,
emphasizing better wages and more support for rangers,
through training and provision of equipment, and
new technologies being employed with this increased
professionalism, rather than instead of it.
Other experts warned that heavy-handed militarized
responses to poaching may in fact be detrimental in some
areas. Another participant stressed the importance of
research that will inform anti-poaching activities to ensure
that real causal factors are addressed with sustainable
solutions rather than just “firefighting” the issue in the field.
This means understanding the drivers of poaching and
looking at alternatives from a community point of view that
will contribute to the efforts aimed at reducing poaching.
While controversy remains on the role of terrorist
networks and militarization of anti-poaching operations,
few will dispute the real impact of wildlife crime on
security in the context of rule of law, governance,
national development and the local communities directly
affected. There is too a wider debate emerging among the
intelligence sector regarding the convergence of terror and
organized crime networks that may with time generate a
different picture. Wildlife trafficking does unfortunately
remain, in general, a high profit and low risk enterprise
that organized crime is capitalizing on, but there is no
public evidence these are the same crime groups that
are enabling terror. The RUSI report certainly is clear
where they believe the solutions lie—the international
community working together to enforce current laws and
provide sustainable economic alternatives.

Penny Wallace, Wildlife Crime Initiative Support Officer,
TRAFFIC. E-mail: penny.wallace@traffic.org
Sabri Zain, Director of Policy, TRAFFIC
E-mail: sabri.zain@traffic.org

[Richprins]

Ja...it's a varied thing, IMO, Toks!

Dunno about the difference between terrorists and those involved in high or low-intensity civil war in Africa...

For example "rebels" in West Africa use ivory to fund themselves, as does Renamo in northern Moz...that is why northern Moz has few if any ellies left?

Then you have normal corrupt government officials elsewhere in Africa, as said?