Round the horn (original) (raw)
Campaigners’ fear for elephants, and their own credibility
BANNING almost all cross-border trade in ivory, as the United Nations did in 1989, doesn't seem to have achieved its stated aim, that of ending a smuggling business worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year. Soon the world will be able to assess the effects of a move in the other direction: a decision to let China bid at a one-off auction of legal ivory from four African countries whose elephant populations have stabilised. Hitherto Japan is the only country to have been authorised to make legal bids.
This article appeared in the International section of the print edition under the headline “Round the horn”
From the July 19th 2008 edition
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