© Environment News Service (ENS) 2000
October 23, 2000

BRONX, New York, October 23, 2000 (ENS) - A population of endangered gorillas living in a national park in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has dropped by half due to the ongoing presence of rebels, according to the Bronx Zoo based Wildlife Conservation Society.

Situated along the border of Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda, Kahuzi-Biega National Park has become a battleground, with a variety of rebel groups fighting in the area.

This has resulted in many rebels and refugees taking up residence within the park's borders, where they continue to harvest bamboo - a key gorilla food source - for building materials, and hunt large amounts of wildlife for food and commercial trade. The number of illegal snares has jumped four-fold the Wildlife Conservation Society researchers say.

Conducting wildlife surveys last June in Kahuzi-Biega National Park, a World Heritage Site, biologists from the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Congolese Research Center for Natural Sciences found just 130 endangered eastern lowland gorillas, known as Grauer's gorillas, in their study site, down from 245 counted in the same location in 1996.

The team also found that forest elephants have been totally decimated in the area. The number of elephants was estimated at 9,000 by the World Conservation Monitoring Center in 1989.

A vast area of primary tropical forest dominated by two spectacular extinct volcanoes, Kahuzi and Biega, the park was once rich in diverse and abundant animal species. "One of the last groups of mountain gorillas consisting only of about 250 individuals, lives in the park," the UNESCO World Heritage Commission wrote in 1997 when inscribing the park on the List of World Heritage in Danger.

The most recent survey, made possible by support from the German Government Technical Cooperation (GTZ), the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International, Institut Congolais pour la Conservation de la Nature (ICCN - Congolese National Parks), Lukuru Wildlife Research Project, Ape Alliance and the MacArthur Foundation, could only look at the safer eastern mountain sector, where tourism was operating prior to the war.

"It's tragic that this world class park, once so famous for its gorillas and other wildlife, is becoming better known for civil war," said Omari Ilambu, a ICCN biologist working with the Wildlife Conservation Society. "The future of Kahuzi-Biega's gorilla population is becoming more critical each day."

The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) had planned a census for 1998, but safety issues within the park caused a two-year delay.

During this year's count, more than 50 Congolese soldiers accompanied the researchers into the park. In August, rebels killed 10 people, including government officials and a soldier, while they attempted to mark the park's boundaries.

The Wildlife Conservation Society is calling for increased financial support from the international community for Kahuzi-Biega, so that park guards can be better trained and armed to patrol the forest.

Last year, WCS helped train some guards to better defend the park from rebel groups, but say that much more needs to be done.

"Although the reduction in gorilla populations is alarming, the population might already have disappeared from the area without the continuous support mainly by GTZ and conservation groups," Ilambu said. "Government authorities in this region need to acknowledge their national heritage, and work with conservation groups and funders to improve the protection of this park and others in the region."

The situation in the park is not new, but it is getting worse. The World Conservation Monitoring Center wrote in 1997, "The site has been much affected by the influx of refugees. Park facilities had been looted and destroyed, and most of the park staff have fled the area. The park may also be serving as a hideout for large militia groups, as well as for illegal settlers. This has led to fires, increased poaching and the illegal removal and burning of timber."

The World Conservation Union-IUCN has received several pleas from the staff of the Park for international aid to rebuild both park infrastructure and staff morale.

Before the war, Kahuzi had about 3,000 visitors a year, and this was a valuable source of income for the park and the communities nearby," says Vital Katembo, Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Europe project manager. "Now, no one risks going to the park and control of the area is extremely difficult. We are really in a very desperate situation."

There are fewer than 650 mountain gorillas left anywhere in the world. Another group living on the Virunga volcanoes of neighboring Rwanda were made famous by the 1987 film "Gorillas in the Mist" which dramatized the conservation work of Dian Fossey and her murder while she was trying to protect the endangered gorillas. Error: Unable to read footer file.