China-Africa: China will honour global ivory obligations: foreign ministry
China on Tuesday promised to honour its international obligations to protect endangered animals, as it began to buy ivory in Namibia in the first legal sale of elephant tusks in nearly a decade.
“We implement our international obligations to protect endangered wild animals and we have always honoured our international obligations,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told reporters when asked about the ivory sale.
“In this regard, we will uphold and honour our international obligations.”
Nine tonnes of ivory went under the hammer in Namibia on Tuesday, beginning nearly two weeks of sales of 108 tonnes of ivory in four Southern African countries — exclusively for Chinese and Japanese buyers.
The four countries — Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and South Africa — have been authorised by CITES, the international convention that regulates trade in endangered species, to make the one-off sale.
But some conservationists fear that the sudden arrival of so much legal ivory in China and Japan could provide a way for poachers to slip their ill-gotten wares past the eyes of regulators.
Most of the tusks to be auctioned, which come from government stocks, were taken from elephants that died from natural causes or from the culling of herds to prevent overpopulation.
The ivory can go only to China and Japan, which must then track it to prevent it from being resold overseas, in compliance with CITES regulations.
The Asian nations are among the world’s largest markets for ivory, which is used for families’ traditional seals to stamp documents as well as handicrafts.
(XINHUA)