An unauthorized video got millions of views online and through traditional media platforms last week showing the Rutgers University men’s basketball head coach shoving, grabbing, and throwing basketballs at several of the squad’s players in practice and also directing homophobic slurs at them. That video stirred controversy about the conduct of this coach, and it’s led to his firing and to a public apology from him and the university.

Fortunately, we’ve heard no movement, on behalf of the NCAA or any athletic conference, to ban videotaping of basketball practice at the collegiate level.

The HSUS

Yet that’s exactly what the agribusiness industry is telling us should happen with videos exposing abuse at their operations. In response to kickings, beatings, draggings, live-skinning, and other forms of shocking animal abuse captured by HSUS investigators and those from a handful of other animal-protection organizations, leading agriculture organizations are working with their legislative allies to introduce and promote whistleblower suppression bills (so-called “ag-gag” legislation) in nearly a dozen states to make it a crime to take unauthorized pictures on farms, or to apply for a job if their applicant is affiliated with an animal protection group. Yesterday, The New York Times reported on the issue, and dozens of major newspapers throughout the country—from the Arkansas Democrat Gazette to the Bakersfield Californian to the Indianapolis Star—have condemned this attempt to prevent the public from getting any view of what happens on factory farms and other animal-use operations. Last year, three states—Iowa, Missouri, and Utah—passed such bills, on top of bills enacted in Kansas, Montana, and North Dakota to accomplish the same goal.

As The Times reported, it was the HSUS videos of horse soring, the abuse of downer cows, the lifelong immobilization of breeding pigs, and other unsettling conduct that triggered that counter-maneuver by the industry. In so many of these cases, HSUS investigations have produced criminal convictions, the shutdown of slaughter plants, and even, in the case of our famous Hallmark undercover operation, massive meat recalls. But in other cases, the goal was not to produce a criminal complaint, but to expose routine, systemic abuses of animals that are legal. 

There is a complex “politics of visibility” at play in the struggle over these attempts to suppress investigations and whistleblower efforts at farms and slaughter plants. As the New School political scientist Timothy Pachirat explains in his striking recent work, “Every Twelve Seconds: Industrialized Slaughter and the Politics of Sight,” the mass production and slaughter of animals for food in industrial society relies on a deliberate walling off of the entire process of raising and killing from the consumer. Highly industrialized production and slaughter now occurs on an increasingly small concentration of massive facilities in out-of-the way places. More specifically, the raising and killing occurs in highly compartmentalized, elaborately secured facilities, even designed to thwart or complicate mandated government inspections. The spate of ag-gag bills represents an extension of that mentality of maintaining the physical isolation of the facilities and keeping the images out of sight for the millions of people in whose name the work of producing and killing is being undertaken.

It is true that many people don’t want to see what goes on in the business of killing animals for food, or raising them by the millions in terrible conditions, since the images often cause revulsion and may prompt consumers to examine what happens in the supply chain. In many ways, the factory farming industry depends on the public disassociation of the production and marketing and consumption sides of the business. It is the job of The HSUS and other animal-welfare groups to promote an association of thought for consumers, since so many billions of animals are caught up in the food production system. Consumers should know what happens to the animals who become food. And it’s a moral duty for The HSUS, and indeed for all of society, to expose unlawful conduct as well as lawful conduct that is inconsistent with basic standards of humanity and decency. 

Mr. Pachirat himself concealed his identity as a researcher in applying for a job and then conducting his academic inquiry while working at an Omaha slaughtering plant for six months, where he started as a “liver hanger.” Perhaps he would have been arrested if the current ag-gag legislation introduced in Nebraska had been in place when he did his undercover work.

 

It is taking winter a long time to release its grip here in Washington, D.C., but this unusually cold spring has not slowed down the local wildlife. Our Humane Wildlife Services team has been out in full force—climbing through attics and peering down chimneys for squirrels and raccoons.

As part of our commitment and investment in developing and perfecting humane approaches to urban wildlife control, our team keeps detailed records of every wildlife exclusion job they perform, how well it worked, how long it took for mothers to retrieve and move their babies and what might be done to improve reunion success. Humane Wildlife Services does not trap and relocate or kill wild animals that are causing conflicts with homeowners, which is often the common practice in the burgeoning wildlife control industry. Rather, we simply evict the attic-dwelling squirrel or chimney-living raccoon, remove babies if present, and block any entry points that were being used to gain access to the structure we want to protect. 

Heather Fone/The HSUS

We then reunite the babies with their mother by using specially constructed reunion boxes in which the young can be comfortably held and warmed if necessary until mom comes back to retrieve them—which the mother almost always does. Then, using her extensive knowledge of alternative den sites (scientists refer to an animal’s “cognitive map” of the home range or territory they occupy), the mother moves the young to an already known and existing safe harbor and remains within her home range in which she can easily acquire the needed resources necessary to raise her young. 

The concept is elegantly simple, solves homeowners’ problems, and saves animal lives. But it is far less practiced than the lethal option of trapping and killing the mother and either leaving babies to die in their attic or chimney den or removing and surrendering them to a wildlife rehabilitator, who is likely to already be swamped with orphans to care for and is unnecessarily burdened with others who need not have been remitted to their care. 

The HSUS is committed to making this practice an industry standard and utilizing it elsewhere wherever possible. That is why our urban wildlife specialists have focused on the broader concept of orphan reuniting; actively working and promoting the development of reunion criteria for many species of wildlife.  For instance, recent advances in wildlife rehabilitation have demonstrated that many orphaned birds of prey can successfully be re-adopted by their own parents or even other adults if the proper vocal cues are used to attract attention to them as quickly as possible.

We are learning that an owl or hawk chick blown from a nest and brought by a caring individual to a wildlife rehabilitator stands an excellent chance of being reunited with a parent or even an unfamiliar adult and cared for if brought back out to entice the adults to reunite. Recordings of the young’s calls can be broadcast to help attract the adult animals to begin providing care. Because the maternal instinct is so strong the young’s vocalizations are a powerful attractant to their parent(s) and playing them has helped reunite young even days after the original separation occurred.  Every young animal we can successfully reunite with an adult allows for more resources for animals that are not candidates for reuniting and who may need long-term care. 

Reunion and reuniting are important keys to the future of the humane treatment of urban wildlife.  The HSUS is committed to these concepts and we’re investing in developing and perfecting these techniques. It’s worth every penny. 

Click here to enjoy our latest reunion video of the first squirrel babies of the year.

Found an injured or orphaned animal? Click here for resources.

If there were peaceful beasts as large as dinosaurs still roaming the Earth, would we marvel at them and go to extraordinary lengths to protect these creatures – treating them as living monuments and biological treasures? Or would we kill them for commerce or mere territorialism? 

Well, we don’t have to speculate, but just make an historical assessment of our behavior toward blue whales – the largest animal to ever live on the planet – with some of these creatures known to weigh in at 180 metric tons (and a tongue that weighs nearly 3 metric tons!) and reaching a length of 100 feet.

Adrian Baddeley/iStock

Sadly, we went on a decades-long killing spree beginning in the late 1800s (with the invention of the steam engine, whalers could keep up with blue whales for the first time), and brought them to the edge of extinction by the mid-20th century, aided by new technologies and killing apparatuses.

Now, the results of a seven week research expedition in the frigid Antarctic waters of the Southern Ocean, undertaken by the 10-nation Southern Ocean Research Partnership, offer new insights into these rarely-seen giants and eviscerate the argument advanced by the Japanese apologists for whaling in the 21st century. Japan is not trying to kill blue whales, not now, anyway, but the more we can learn about them, the better off all of the world’s whales will be. The substantial data obtained using nonlethal research methods stands in stark contrast to the lethal methods Japanese ‘scientific’ whaling employs in both efficacy and cruelty. There is simply no justification for targeting and killing hundreds of whales annually, including endangered fin and sei whales, under the guise of scientific research when such reliable, humane alternatives exist.

Taking advantage of a loophole in the International Whaling Commission’s 1986 moratorium on whaling, the agency that implements Japan’s scientific whaling program asserts that the stomach contents of the whales killed provide important biological and ecological samples that aid in their efforts to better understand the Southern Ocean ecosystem as well as the feeding habits of the whales. But data gathered from this annual slaughter – carried out under the guise of science – is just a pretense. And as whale meat stocks in Japan continue to increase while the nation’s appetite for whale declines, many Japanese citizens are wondering why their tax dollars are going to fund the program.

In contrast, the team of researchers from the Antarctic Blue Whales Project of the Southern Ocean Research Partnership, of which the United States is a member, collected 57 photo identifications and recorded 26,545 calls – generating information that will be invaluable in studying these enormous yet elusive creatures, about which we know relatively little. The results of this nonlethal research will, hopefully, give us further insight into how we can protect these and other whale species so they may continue to grace our oceans, and how we can act as stewards so that future generations may share the planet with them as well.

When I travel around the country, many advocates ask me, “how can I do more to help animals?” Responding to that question, sometime back, on “A Humane Nation,” I wrote a blog listing 55 ways to help. One of the best ongoing training grounds for engagement is our Animal Care Expo, a world-class educational conference and full-scale international trade show. This year, it’s happening in Nashville from May 8-11, and you can register online today (if you register by Sunday, you can get the bargain registration rate) to participate in a life-changing, inspirational event. 

I predict this year’s Animal Care Expo will be the biggest one yet, with more than 2,000 animal care professionals and other advocates from 40 different countries. We’ll also have a trade show, with booths and displays from more than 175 corporations in our field. It’s the largest education conference in the fields of animal sheltering and control, rescue and emergency services and animal advocacy. It’s a way to recharge your batteries by being around others of like mind, and to learn about innovation, best practices, and issues in our field. 

I’m excited to announce that Dan Heath, co-author of “Switch: How To Change Things When Change Is Hard,” will be presenting during our welcome session on the Expo’s opening night. The HSUS team has found this book incredibly helpful in our work – and we’re sure Dan’s words of wisdom will empower our attendees and get them thinking in new and fresh ways. I’m also excited to announce that we’ve added new intensive networking opportunities and more than 55 professional development workshops, including new tracks in hot topics and rescue central. We’re also hosting a special session on the shelter community and its challenges in relation to cats and controlling cat populations called “Radically Rethinking Our Response to Cats,” as part of our continuing leadership on this issue.

In today’s world, about 3 million healthy and treatable pets are euthanized in shelters every year. There’s no simple or formulaic solution to this problem, but by combining our talents, together we have seen tremendous strides, and we will reach the goal of no pets euthanized for lack of a home. At The HSUS , our work aims to tackle this issue on multiple fronts from The Shelter Pet Project, which promotes pet adoption to potential owners, to our Pets for Life program, which extends the reach of pet care to under-served areas and through the support of local animal shelter and rescue groups. But at Expo, we’ll also be talking about horses, laboratory animals, farm animals, wildlife and every other kind of animal, and how we, together, can do something about their plight and to make the world a better place for every one of them.

The HSUS has drawn a line in the sand – no trophy hunting of wolves in Michigan. 

Today, together with other members of a broad coalition of organizations, The HSUS submitted 253,705 signatures in support of a referendum to nullify the Michigan legislature’s December 2012 act to reclassify wolves as a game species, which is a pretext for setting up a trophy hunting and commercial trapping season. If the state certifies the petition – as it should, since petitioners collected well in excess of the 161,000 signatures needed to qualify the measure for the November 2014 ballot – it will suspend the wolf hunting law and block hunting seasons this year and next. There’ll be a statewide vote on the issue then, and if Michigan residents reject the idea of wolf hunting by casting “no” votes, then we can make that protection of wolves indefinite.

Volunteers and members of the Keep Michigan Wolves
Protected campaign at the state capital with the 253,705
signatures they collected in only 67 days.

I wrote earlier this year that 2012 was the worst year for wolves in the United States in decades – with ruthless sport hunting programs conducted in Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, often involving hound hunting of wolves, steel-jawed leghold traps, and other inhumane and unsporting practices. We at The HSUS decided to implement a plan to turn it around with a series of lawsuits and our Michigan campaign, designed to show politicians everywhere that Americans value wolves and don’t think they should be killed for frivolous purposes.

In 2006, we blocked the shooting of mourning doves in Michigan, preserving their long-standing protected status in the state. Now we want to do that for wolves, who have not been hunted in Michigan in decades and are only beginning to recover from the brink of extinction. We and our coalition partners will have to conduct a sophisticated public-relations campaign to win that vote in a November 2014 vote, but we’ve taken a big and necessary step today by submitting these petitions, with so many Michigan voter signatures in support.

My thanks to the 2,000 Michigan volunteers who braved cold, ice and snow during these last 67 days to collect signatures from registered voters. We amassed signatures in every one of the state’s 83 counties, demonstrating support for wolf protection from every corner of the state, from Detroit to Iron Mountain. I am quite sure that every one of them had in mind the notion that killing wolves just for bragging rights or for the pelt or trophy is unacceptable and inhumane.

We campaign hard against baiting and hounding of predators, contest kills, captive hunts, trophy hunts, poaching, the trade in wildlife parts, and so many other human-caused problems for wildlife. But arguably the greatest anthropogenic threat to wildlife is destruction of habitat. That’s one reason why the Humane Society Wildlife Land Trust works so hard to protect the living environments of wild creatures. 

Since 1993, the Humane Society Wildlife Land Trust, alone or in partnership with other conservation groups, has participated in the protection of more than 2 million acres of wildlife habitat in 38 states and eight foreign countries.

John Harrison

I am so pleased to report that we’ve just added a 1,122-acre wilderness property in Sonoma County, California to our quilt of protected lands. Located in the southern extension of the Pacific Northwest’s temperate rainforests, this sanctuary has spectacular views of Buck Knoll Ridge to the north and Marble Mine Ridge to the south. It is bisected by a free-flowing perennial stream that provides critical habitat for the foothill yellow-legged frog and steelhead trout. Mature forests — including redwoods, oak woodland, Douglas-fir and tanoak forests — cover nearly 90 percent of the sanctuary, and portions of the property provide habitat for the northern spotted owl and marbled murrelet (a small North Pacific seabird), both species listed as threatened under the Federal Endangered Species Act.  

The landowners we work with via HSWLT tell us how thankful they are to find a land trust that shares their concern and compassion for wildlife, one that cares about all wildlife, whether endangered or not, as HSWLT does. On these lands, we’ll allow no sport hunting or trapping, won’t sell off lands for McMansions or strip malls, or cut down trees or mine the earth for minerals or energy. It’s a special role, and it’s one we’re honored to fulfill for those who want to ensure such protections.

This shared sense of humane values is what led trustees of the Thelma Doelger Animal and Wildlife Preserve Trust to select HSWLT to permanently protect this beautiful patch of nature – which supports an estimated 160 wildlife species. Originally used as a family retreat, the property also became a sanctuary for primates formerly used in research. Thelma Doelger kindly took them in, providing safe, healthy housing and caregivers for their remaining years. Thelma Doelger’s deep interest in animals, and in particular, her sensitivity for research animals who had suffered abuse, as well as her desire to ensure that wildlife would continue to have the habitat they need to survive, makes HSWLT the perfect match for her vision for the land and wildlife.

We are here to carry forward Thelma Doelger’s compassionate vision, and we are deeply grateful to both her and the trustees for the opportunity to be responsible for protecting this significant landscape and all of its wildlife. Learn more about our habitat protect efforts at hswlt.org. 

The election of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio to lead the more than 1 billion member Roman Catholic Church was met with widespread praise, and many have found much to admire in the new pope’s humility and initial focus. At The HSUS, we were heartened to learn that the new pontiff selected a name in honor of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of the poor as well as animals and the environment.

iStock

His two most recent predecessors, Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict, spoke of our call to care for creation and each expressed concern for the treatment of animals.

We’re hopeful that Pope Francis will put even more emphasis on caring for God’s creatures, and he’s off to a great start. In his homily on Tuesday, Francis said, "The vocation of being a ‘protector,’ however, is not just something involving us Christians alone; it also has a prior dimension which is simply human, involving everyone. It means protecting all creation, the beauty of the created world, as the Book of Genesis tells us and as Saint Francis of Assisi showed us. It means respecting each of God’s creatures and respecting the environment in which we live.” He goes on to say, “Please, I would like to ask all those who have positions of responsibility in economic, political and social life, and all men and women of good will: let us be ‘protectors’ of creation, protectors of God’s plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment.”

Over the weekend, Francis bestowed a blessing on a guide dog who was accompanying a journalist with a visual impairment. While there will be speculation about the meaning behind these small acts in the early going, Francis’ words say a great deal about what we can hope for in the coming years.

When speaking with the media just days after his selection, Francis said, “Some people wanted to know why the Bishop of Rome wished to be called Francis. Some thought of Francis Xavier, Francis De Sales, and also Francis of Assisi. I will tell you the story. During the election, I was seated next to the Archbishop Emeritus of São Paolo and Prefect Emeritus of the Congregation for the Clergy, Cardinal Claudio Hummes: a good friend, a good friend! … And when the votes reached two thirds, there was the usual applause, because the pope had been elected. And he gave me a hug and a kiss, and said: ‘Don't forget the poor!’ And those words came to me: the poor, the poor. Then, right away, thinking of the poor, I thought of Francis of Assisi. Then I thought of all the wars, as the votes were still being counted, till the end. Francis is also the man of peace. That is how the name came into my heart: Francis of Assisi. For me, he is the man of poverty, the man of peace, the man who loves and protects creation; these days we do not have a very good relationship with creation, do we?”

As I’ve mentioned before on A Humane Nation, our greatest charge at The HSUS must be to prevent cruelty before it occurs. While animal rescue is vital, it is not enough. We cannot rescue our way out of the many problems animals face. Indeed, the very notion of rescuing animals from factory farms, the fur trade or other legal businesses is implausible and a misapplication of the concept. To complement our work to help individual animals in crisis, and to succeed in it, we need structural changes – new policies and standards, new ways of generating commerce, new and enlightened attitudes and behaviors, and a new and humane economy.

Tim Long/Long Photography
Carrie Ann Inaba and Uggie at last year's event.
Inaba will emcee the 2013 gala.

We also need a new level of awareness and engagement. One way we do that is by celebrating people who use their talents to help our cause – be they educators lawmakers, corporate leaders, law enforcement agents, lawyers, entertainers or others.

On March 23, we celebrate reporters, entertainment media creatives and corporations for their pathbreaking work for animals at the Genesis Awards Benefit Gala. I hope you’ll consider attending this star-studded event in Los Angeles – an event where we recognize those who are showing the way and taking action that helps animals in very practical terms.

Join us as global pop star Ke$ha receives the Wyler Award for her work to help street dogs, stop shark finning, end Canada’s seal hunt and more. See whether “The Colbert Report,” “Futurama,” or “The New Normal” takes home the Sid Caesar Comedy Award, and watch as “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Harry’s Law,” and “Sons of Anarchy” duke it out in the dramatic series category. From dogfighting to hoarding to the abuse of downer cows and Tennessee Walking Horses, all animal issues will be in the spotlight at this one-of-a-kind event.

The evening will also highlight three major HSUS campaign priorities:  Pets For Life, Chimps Deserve Better and Farm Animal Protection, and proceeds from the gala will support these efforts.

Tickets are still available and can be purchased online here >>

Wolf reintroduction in the Northern Rockies, from inception to the present, can only be considered a colossal failure.

The wolves did their part – after they were trapped and relocated to Yellowstone National Park, they reproduced, built their packs, and expanded their range to a large portion of southern Idaho, Montana and northern Wyoming – where they obviously reclaimed a niche they had long served before their extirpation. Their presence reverberated throughout the ecosystems in which they live, checking the growth of deer, elk and bison populations through predation and, as a result, influencing species composition, forest regeneration and even stream flow. They killed very few livestock, and no person has been harmed by a wolf. They did their part, and the proponents of wolf reintroduction have been proven right, in terms of their forecasts.

Alamy

But reintroduction has failed because of us. Humans failed the animals. This year alone, people legally shot and trapped 769 wolves – close to half the entire “recovered” population of the Northern Rockies. As a matter of the health and safety of wolves, this can only be considered a terrible, unconscionable outcome. It’s not just that long-studied wolves in Yellowstone were killed, though that’s bad enough – but throughout their entire range, they have been subjected to pain and suffering for no good reason, traumatized by the killing of family members, and turned upside down with the radical disruption of their pack structures.

If the metric for success was merely reintroduction, then that’s certainly been achieved. But if we are truly concerned about wolves – the animals as individuals, since that’s what they are – then there can be no compelling positive assessment of how they’ve fared. How can we countenance an outcome that results, in a single year, in the intentional killing of nearly half the entire population in the Northern Rockies? That’s not a pruning, but a pogrom.

Lawmakers in the Northern Rockies states, apparently goaded on by the hunting and ranching lobbies, have had it out for wolves since the inception of the idea of reintroduction. They never liked it, and fought it every step of the way. They possessed an irrational fear, even a hatred, of wolves, and they’ve had their revenge.

As soon as wolves were removed as a listed species under the terms of the Endangered Species Act, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming went on a killing spree, authorizing lengthy trophy hunting seasons (Wyoming basically allows year-round killing now), providing no safe zones for wolves, and introducing the use of cruel steel-jawed leg hold traps. Add in the methodical killing by federal Wildlife Services agents and the aggregate impact can be considered nothing less than slaughter. Hunters and trappers in these states killed 553 wolves this year (with Idaho killing 259 and barely besting Montana’s body count of 225), while Wildlife Services agents killed another 216.

I was uneasy when reintroduction occurred because I feared that wolves were being released into a hostile setting. That instinct was right. We should not reintroduce animals into areas where people want to slaughter them; it’s as simple as that.

There was praise and excitement about wolf reintroduction, and an abundance of science has now proved their beneficial ecological impacts. But no matter how well intentioned, that’s not enough. These poor creatures are suffering because we didn’t take the long-term into account and perhaps had too much faith in our fellow man.

Live in Michigan? Please join the effort to protect wolves >>

Yesterday, at the United Nations conference on wildlife trade in Bangkok, a proposal from the United States and Russia to crack down on international commercial trade in hides and other polar bear body parts went down to defeat, with 38 nations favoring the proposal and 42 opposing it. Noticeably and disappointingly, 46 countries including the 27-member European Union, which votes as a bloc, abstained. Canada led the opposition to the U.S.-Russia proposal, because some people in communities in northern Canada hunt polar bears and sell the parts in international trade.

James Richey/iStock

The Canadian hunters sell the hides to auction houses where they go for up to $12,000 each, a price double that of only five years ago and a sure sign of increased market demand. The number of hides sold at auction in Canada also tripled during this time. As polar bears get rarer, demand for their skins is increasing. The Canadian hunters also sell about 100 permits annually to foreign trophy hunters, collecting huge fees for the sale of hunting rights and guide fees.

Between 2001 and 2010, there were 32,350 polar bear parts catalogued in international trade, which equals 5,680 bears killed for commercial (e.g. bear skin rugs) and semi-commercial purposes (e.g. trophies). Canada is the main exporting country, while the U.S., Russia, Greenland and Norway prohibit export for commercial trade and trophy hunting.

The EU, Japan, and, increasingly, China, are main importers for skins and skin pieces for commercial purposes. Historically, the U.S. was the biggest market for trophies, although imports were mostly banned in 2008. However, there is still a major fight in Congress on the trophy import issue, with Safari Club International and the National Rifle Association pleading with lawmakers to amend the federal law to allow their wealthy trophy-hunting members to bring home the remains of bears they shot in Canada just before the U.S. government listed the species under federal law as "threatened" with extinction.

Scientists projected in 2007 that we will lose two thirds of the world's polar bears by 2050 – a 66 percent decline in 43 years. Most groups are united in wanting to deal with the effects of climate change on polar bears and other species. But there are differences on the trade issues. The HSUS and Humane Society International, along with the Natural Resources Defense Council and the International Fund for Animal Welfare, argued that the U.S.-Russia trade prohibition will help polar bears by halting the frivolous killing of the animals for their parts. Amazingly enough, the World Wildlife Fund, which has sponsorship from Coca-Cola to protect polar bears, opposed the U.S.-Russia proposal, arguing that climate change is a more severe threat than international commercial trade in polar bear skins. It was this opposition from the World Wildlife Fund that contributed to the defeat of the U.S.-Russia proposal.

In my mind, their argument is akin to someone saying they fear nuclear proliferation, and therefore they oppose efforts to prevent pollution of our rivers or the destruction of public lands. Yes, climate change may present a much longer term threat to polar bears, but we can attack threats to the bears from multiple angles. It will take many years to turn around climate change threats, but that should not slow down our efforts to stop international trade in polar bears right now.

Sincere thanks should go to the Obama Administration, to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and to their partners in the Russian Federation for advancing the polar bear protection proposal. It is a painful loss for all of us concerned about polar bears, and we are deeply disturbed to know that even as polar bears suffer the crippling impact of climate-induced habitat loss, Canadians will be able to kill as many polar bears as they like and sell their parts around the world.

The international convention continues its work with a wide range of critical decisions coming up in the next few days dealing with manatees, turtles, elephants, rhinos, sharks and other species threatened by trade. The HSI team is there in Bangkok, working tirelessly to protect these vulnerable creatures.