Global Courant
Sixteen rhinoceroses released into Garamba National Park more than 16 years after the last was poached in the reserve.
Sixteen southern white rhinoceroses have been released into Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), officials said Saturday, reintroducing an endangered species that had been decimated by poaching.
The last northern white rhinoceros in the park, which is located in northeastern DRC, was poached in 2006.
According to a joint statement from the park and conservation groups, 16 southern white rhinoceroses have been transported from a private reserve in South Africa to Garamba.
“The return of white rhinoceroses to the Democratic Republic of Congo is a testament to our country’s commitment to preserving biodiversity,” Yves Milan Ngangay, the director general of the Congolese Institute for Nature Conservation (ICCN), said in a statement. .
The operation was led by the African Parks conservation NGO ICCN and Canadian mining company Barrick Gold, which sponsored the relocation of the rhinoceros.
Established in 1938, Garamba National Park is one of the oldest in Africa. But conflict, poaching and chronic insecurity in the unstable DRC have decimated the wildlife over the years.
African Parks CEO Peter Fearnhead also said in the statement that efforts to save the park’s northern white rhinos were “too little, too late.”
“This reintroduction is the beginning of a process by which the southern white rhino can fulfill the role of the northern white rhino in the landscape as a genetic alternative,” he said.
More southern white rhinos are expected to be sent to Garamba National Park in the future.
