UN meeting weighs China's request to import African ivory

A U.N. meeting starting Monday will decide whether China should be allowed to import more than 100 tons of elephant ivory in a one-off sale of African government stockpiles.

The United Nations body charged with monitoring trade in endangered species says China qualifies for the import because it has sufficiently enforced rules on the sale of ivory.

"It's very evident that China has made an enormous commitment," said Tom Milliken, a senior investigator at Traffic, the world's largest wildlife trade monitor. "Seizures are occurring at a very fast clip these days. The government is putting a lot more in enforcement efforts."

But some environment groups disagree and say their case has been the strengthened by the Chinese government's revelation that it lost track of 121 tons of ivory over a dozen years that probably was sold on illegal markets.

China told the U.N. Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species in 2003 that the "shortfall" _ equal to the tusks from about 11,000 dead elephants _ was accumulated between 1991 and 2002. The Associated Press obtained the document last week from the Environmental Investigation Agency, a watchdog based in Washington and London that is seeking to prevent China from gaining permission to trade ivory.

Elephant ivory is a booming black market commodity, with tusks, jewelry and trinkets bringing in millions of dollars for smugglers and sellers after it was banned globally in a 1989 U.N. accord. Since then, some one-time sales by African nations have been allowed on a case-by-case basis, but only Japan has been approved to buy it. China now also wants approval from the 172 other nations that have signed onto CITES.

"There are just huge questions that are unanswered, and we believe the Chinese government has the responsibility to provide answers to the international community," Allan Thornton, EIA's chairman, said last week. "The ivory trade is out of control."

The group argues that China lacks control of its ivory and that allowing it to import more ivory legally would only lead to additional slaughter of elephants and greater illegal smuggling and trade for their valuable ivory tusks.

It says more than 20,000 elephants a year are killed illegally in Africa and Asia for the ivory black market, and that Chinese nationals have been implicated in illegal ivory seizures in more than 20 African nations.

Milliken, who was part of CITES' original mission to China in 2005, countered: "Does illegal trade continue? Yes. But that's probably inevitable. China is clearly rising to the occasion and putting out all the stops."

He rejected that one-off ivory sales have any correlation with a rise in illegal smuggling, noting the example of Japan.

Trade in elephant ivory far eclipses any demand for other animals' tusks. Much of the ivory destined for China is carved into jewelry and ornaments bought by tourists from other parts of Asia.

The U.N. body authorized Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe last year to make a single sale of 108 tons of government stocks. After the sale, the countries will not be allowed to export ivory again for nine years.

The U.N. Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species also will discuss the farming of tigers in Asia, which is being sought by Chinese businessman as a way around a 1993 ban on trade in tiger parts _ a valued ingredient in traditional medicine believed to cure ailments from convulsions to skin disease, and to increase sexual potency.

Conservationists, who say there are only about 5,500 tigers remaining in the wild, argue that the farms would spur illegal poaching of tigers because the parts are indistinguishable and it is always cheaper to kill a wild animal.

The U.N. meeting, scheduled through Friday, also plans to look into sales of mahogany timber from the Amazon basin and illegal poaching of rhinoceroses in Congo, India, Mozambique, Nepal, South Africa and Zimbabwe.