Armed conflicts affect environment and wildlife: Experts

KIGALI, Rwanda

Besides disturbing human populations, armed conflicts are reported to have disastrous effects on the environment, as well as wild life. From the bloody Syrian war to conflicts in Africa, animals have been victims of the collateral damage.

Braving war and unrelenting bombing in the city of Aleppo in Syria in 2016, environmentalists worked overtime to rescue 13 remaining animals, including a traumatized black bear and a pregnant lioness from the city zoo. The war had claimed lives of 300 animals. Like many other Syrians, the animals initially took refuge in Turkey. Later they were shifted to a national park in Jordan.

As the world observes International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict, on Wednesday, experts believe that it was an opportunity to reflect on the role of war on damaging natural environment and discuss ways to limit environmental destruction caused by armed conflicts.

Researchers have found that wars and armed conflict have led to severe declines in large mammal populations in Africa’s protected areas. "Since Somalia’s civil war began in 1991 80% of country’s wildlife migrated, because of the conflicts and deforestation and climate change," Zubeyr Hassan, Mogadishu based wildlife expert told Anadolu Agency.

Now with the semblance of peace returning the region, elephants have been traced in Lower Jubba forests, who may have returned from Kenya to their original habitat.

Somalia’s famed wild dog population entirely disappeared during the conflict. The armed insurgency had its impact on foxes, lions and other animals as well, according to Mohamud Ali Hussien, climate change activist and a religious leader.

"War is bad for wildlife in as many ways as for people. Conservation suffers because rangers often have to flee the fighting. Moreover, rebels and soldiers often feed their troops on bushmeat and finance their operations with ivory, timber, charcoal and minerals from protected areas," he said.

Elephants disappear in South Sudan, Angola

There are 5,000 elephants in South Sudan, which is recuperating from a civil war. The region had more than 100,000 elephants a decade ago, before the civil war engulfed the region.

The Spokesperson of Ministry of Wildlife and Conservation, Maj. Gen. Khamis Adieng, said due to armed conflicts, around six national parks were affected. All the wild animals ran away.

Similarly, in Angola, a study revealed that only 3,400 elephants exist in Cuando-Cubango province in the southeast corner of the country. The region had 70,000 elephants 25 years ago before the war. The civil war in Angola was fought from 1975-2002.

During the Rwandan civil war almost three-quarters of a million people lived in camps on the edge of Virunga national park. According to the Worldwatch Institute, around 1,000 tones of wood was removed from the park every day for two years in order to build shelters, feed cooking fires and to create charcoal for sale. “By the time the conflict ended 105 square kilometers of forest had been damaged and 35 square kilometers stripped bare, “said the study.

Further, in another war-ravaged country of Afghanistan, wildlife and habitats have disappeared. The war has stripped the country of its trees, including precious native pistachio woodlands. The Costs of War Project says illegal logging by warlords and wood harvesting by refugees has caused more than one-third of Afghanistan’s forests to vanish. The number of migratory birds passing through Afghanistan has fallen by 85%.

Marie Jacobsson, a special rapporteur to the UN’s International Law Commission charged with assessing how legal frameworks can protect the environment from armed conflict, says the international legal protections are "rudimentary".

“Laws and codes of practice may serve to ameliorate a fraction of the damage caused by the wars waged by large armies. A far greater -- and possibly achievable -- impact would be to reduce the vast standing armies the world maintains in a time of relative global tranquility,” argues Jacobsson.

Legal frameworks, however, cannot be imposed during civil wars, be that in Africa, Syria or elsewhere. Desperate people will continue to maintain their lives at the expense of all around them.

*Moses Michael-Phiri from Blantyre, Benjamin Takpiny from Juba, South Sudan and Mohammed Dhaysane from Mogadishu, Somalia, have contributed to this report.