News

This morning, the Mail on Sunday broke a news story which takes lion trophy hunting to a new low.

We were shocked and appalled when we heard the news yesterday that a lion hunt would be offered as a raffle prize to raise money.

While the hunting operators in the Bubye Valley Conservancy say that anyone can enter the raffle and elect not to kill the lion, it is telling that the raffle will be drawn at the annual Safari Club International (SCI) Convention in February in Las Vegas. However, indications from the US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) are that all lion trophy hunting imports from Zimbabwe and other African countries will be placed on a maoratorium from January 22nd.

This should diminish the enthusiasm of US hunters to enter the raffle. It would be good now if the EU and the UK in particular would follow America's fantastic example and block the entry of any further lion trophies.

We do hope that Oxford University's WildCRU will reconsider their response to this raffle and publicly condemn it as it will occur in one of WildCRU's lion research project areas.

You can read the Mail on Sunday article here

Picture Credit: Daily Mail