TNAG-2132-FCO40-3047-Hong-Kong-and-the-ivory-trade-1990 — Page 75

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MRE 201/2

BRITISH HIGH COMMISSION

P.O. Box joads. Bruce House. Standard Street, Nairobi Fr Telegraphic Address: Ukrep Nurcoi Telephone: Nairobi 335944

Telex: Nar

6 March 1990

29 MAN 1990

RJ S Edis Esq

EAD

FCO

London

Azas Richard,

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PROPOSED IVORY TRADE INFORMATION PROJECT

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1. Dr Iain Douglas-Hamilton has been in touch with this High Commission whe to canvas support for his proposal to establish a small secretariat, probably based ning in London, which would draw on the resources of international corporate pravidly. investigators and cooperate with investigative journalists and national customs and police authorities with the twin objective of coordinating information so as to facilitate prosecutions of criminals dealing in poached ivory and generally accumulating information on the ivory trade and making it available to the press with the objective of educating the general public.

2. The proposal, we are told, has the support of the World Wildlife Fund despite the overlap with the TRAFFIC organisation funded by the WWF. The permanent staff of the secretariat would be small, probably two, one senior expert on the African elephant and the other essentially an intelligence analyst. A major firm of international corporate investigators, Kroll, would be willing to assist and Dr Douglas-Hamilton believes on the basis of past experience that so would investigative journalists. Douglas-Hamilton argues that an organisation of this sort is essential if an unholy alliance is not to be forged between one of the countries having entered a reservation to the CITES ban (he mentioned Zimbabwe) and a traditional centre of the ivory trade such as South Korea or Hong Kong which would effectively undermine the global ban on dealing in ivery to the point where it would be possible to argue at the next CITES meeting that it had failed and should be repealed.

3.

Douglas-Hamilton seeks two things from HMG: a statement of support cn the lines of that received from the Fish and Wildlife Service of the US Department of the Interior (copy attached) and a contribution towards the setting up of the project. He has a number of corporate donors lined up and implied that he has pledges for the greater part of the £170,000 that the first year of operation would cost. He has, however, suggested that a relatively small payment would give HMG a chance to give a practical demonstration of its commitment to stamping out elephant poaching and would go quite a long way to rebut criticism of our attitude to this on the basis of the Hong Kong stockpile reservation. He mentioned a sum of £30,000 but would obviously be happy to settle for whatever he can get.

4. As seen from here, there is no reason why we should not give Douglas- Hamilton the endorsement he seeks for the setting up of the project, and cogent ärguments in favour. Richard Leakey, with Moi's solid support, will be making public pronouncements on poaching and we should put down a firm marker now that we are squarely on the side of the angels. It will not be essential to this

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