Urge the United States and European Union to protect wild elephants from Zimbabwe, Botswana by affirming the decision at the CITES meeting.
Join the movement
Countries have just voted to end the cruel and barbaric capture and export of wild African elephants from Zimbabwe and Botswana for entertainment and zoos. But the fight to keep baby elephants away from lives of suffering is not over yet! This decision still needs to be affirmed in the final days of the 18th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species before it can become international policy.
The United States voted against this proposal and the European Union rose on the floor to speak against it. We have just learned that those that oppose are likely to try to overturn the decision before the conference ends. If the US and the EU decide not to uphold this landmark decision, baby African elephants in Zimbabwe and Botswana will be torn from their mothers and sold into the animal entertainment business. Let your voice be heard!
Tell the United States and the European Union that wild elephants belong in the wild and they must affirm the decision at the CITES meeting now.
Read a letter from over 35 celebrities calling on the EU to protect baby elephants at CITES.
Please help protect African elephants
We must let these governments know that elephants should not be kept in captivity, thousands of miles from where they belong.
Dear Mike Pompeo, David Bernhardt, President Jean-Claude Juncker, and Commissioner Karmenu Vella,
On the second day of the 18th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, countries voted to restrict the trade in live elephants in Zimbabwe and Botswana to “in situ conservation programmes or secure areas in the wild within the species’ natural range, except in the case of temporary transfers in emergency situations.”
This monumental decision will effectively end the cruel capture and export of live baby African elephants in these two countries to zoos if it is affirmed at the end of the meeting next week in plenary. Since 2012, Zimbabwe has exported 108 wild African elephants to zoos. These elephants were ripped away from their families and homes, subjected to a long and dangerous journey and forced to live in cruel conditions at zoos. Some elephants did not survive the journey. Those that experienced both physical and psychological distress as a result of captivity.
Recognizing the harmful effects of this practice on elephant welfare and its failure to promote elephant conservation, countries voted to end the industry. The United States voted against this proposal and the European Union spoke against it, disheartening positions that ignore the growing public opposition to the capture of wild African elephants for zoos.
I therefore urge you not to seek to overturn this decision, and to instead support it, at the end of the meeting next week. People throughout the world have been celebrating this vote and to vote against it would be a devastating blow to both your constituents and African elephants.
Kind regards,
A Concerned Animal Lover
