Africa-Asia summit agrees tough steps to curb illegal ivory trade
African elephant host nations and countries in Asia to get tough with poachers and smugglers
African and Asian nations have agreed on urgent measures to tackle the illegal ivory trade, from the slaughter of elephants to the trafficking of their valuable tusks to East Asia.
The deal was agreed on Tuesday after top officials and experts from 30 states met in Botswana to tackle an upsurge in elephant poaching as demand for ivory soars from countries such as China and Thailand.
Countries that are home to elephants, and those where their ivory ends up, agreed to "urgent measures to halt the illegal trade and secure elephant populations across Africa", Botswana and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said in a statement.
They vowed to take a "zero tolerance approach", which includes maximum sentences for wildlife crimes and boosting the ability of national agencies to deal with highly organised poaching syndicates.
The meeting also agreed that ivory trafficking should be classified as a "serious crime", paving the way for international co-operation such as mutual legal assistance, asset seizure and forfeiture, and extradition.
"The summit is the first-ever meeting focusing on the dynamics of the entire ivory value chain," the statement said.
Conservation groups at the African Elephant Summit warned that Africa could lose 20 per cent of its elephant population within a decade.