During August-September 2010, INTERPOL coordinated a six country operation (India, Russia, Thailand, Vietnam and Nepal) against the illegal tiger trade. The enforcement action led to the arrest of 25 suspects. Tiger parts and carcasses were also seized. In a single raid in Hanoi, six whole skeletons and six skulls were confiscated. Swift, international enforcement of laws intended to protect the dwindling number of tigers in the wild needs to be at the top of the agenda at the Year of the Tiger summit to be hosted by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg later this year.
On the other side of the world, lawyers representing the US Fish & Wildlife Service were asked by a federal district judge to
explain their position that polar bears are merely "threatened" instead of "endangered" under the Endangered Species Act. Environmental groups urging the court to list the species as endangered, argue that the loss of critical marine habitat due to global climate change puts the bear in danger of extinction now. If arctic sea ice continues to melt at the current rate, polar bears could be extinct by the end of the century. Oil industry and its government allies are concerned that a finding of endangerment could open a legal argument for using the Endangered Species Act to regulate greenhouse gases since the Act prohibits human activities that take habitat the protected animal uses to survive. Obama & Folks decided to
keep the rule the Regime instituted to prohibit government scientists from considering the effects of greenhouse gases on the loss of polar bear habitat.
Environmental groups filed suit in the Eastern District of Louisiana on Wednesday against British Petroleum for harm done to endangered animals by the
Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The petition says that at least 27 endangered species living in the Gulf were harmed by the crude oil, and specifically discusses harm caused to sea turtles, whale, birds and manatees. An oceanographer
testified to the National Oil Spill Commission that at least 50% of the spilled oil remains in the Gulf ecosystem, much of it in coastal and marine sediments. At least 650 miles of coastline was impacted by the disaster. The suit seeks restitution and mitigation of the damage caused to protected animals and their habitats.
