John Sellar has particular empathy for cancer sufferers because cancer claimed the life of his sister. But the top wildlife cop struggles to muster sympathy for the use of crushed rhino horn, largely in Asia, to overcome the illness.
“I think what’s going on is really despicable,” says Scottish-born Sellar, the chief enforcement officer of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites).
“Criminals are preying upon the sufferers of what is one of today’s most horrendous diseases… exploiting sufferers and their relatives at a time of their lives when they’re essentially facing a debilitating and often terminal condition.”
And as more and more Asian cancer sufferers cling to the hope that rhino horn can halt the progress of their disease, our rhinos are falling fast.
Fifty-one rhinos have already been slaughtered this year.
Sellar is part of the International Consortium on Combating Wildlife Crime, a powerful alliance that draws together the Cites secretariat, Interpol, the World Bank, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime and the World Customs Organisation.
It plans to unite nations affected by the illegal trade to reach the organised syndicates behind it.
“One of the things I’ve discovered in my time in Vietnam is that this belief that rhino horn offers some form of cancer assistance seems to be getting more and more widespread among the middle and upper classes.
“It’s common to hear a conversation where someone knows someone who claims their tumour shrank because of the use of crushed rhino horn.
“I’ve spoken to a senior representative of a traditional Asian medicine organisation who says that, historically, rhino horn was never used to treat cancer – it was used for fever. All the information we have suggests there’s no basis for believing rhino horns are beneficial. It’s like telling someone who has lung cancer to chew their fingernails.
“We see people, primarily Asian individuals, travelling the world trying to acquire old rhino horn obtained as a trophy decades ago, from hunting exhibitions or auctions.
“We’ve seen instances where up to £70 000 (R776 000) has been paid for a horn.”
More needs to be done to counter the organised crime syndicates fuelling the illicit trade instead of only “picking off the small fry”.
“My colleagues in Interpol share this feeling that we’re currently rather frustrated by the fact that not enough agencies are following the money. In recent years, it’s become clear that a number of individuals, particularly Vietnamese officials, are funded to travel to South Africa and engage in fraudulent hunts.
“I think the parks and specialised units have done some good work, but there’s scope for more international liaison… For those arriving in South Africa for legal hunts, their details need to be communicated to authorities in their home countries so we can see if it’s a genuine hunt or scam.”
Globally, more imagination is needed to stem the carnage.
“We’ve been focusing too much on wildlife legislation. We need to link this to financial crimes. Al Capone didn’t go to jail because he was a gangster. He went to jail for not paying his tax.”
Sellar is critical of calls to legalise the rhino-horn trade.
“unlike ivory, there is no legal market or destination for rhino horn.
“The only people you can sell it to are criminals and of course there’s no way Cites will authorise that.
“The only way that would happen is if Asian countries say they want to reopen the trade because the horn is useful for cancer, but I haven’t heard of any countries that want to. You will create a market by continuing to tell people falsely that rhino horn is good to cure cancer when it won’t.”
He is equally contemptuous of projects to poison rhino horns. “It’s not the criminals taking the horn – it’s poor cancer sufferers.
“We’re talking about senior figures in government and individuals at high levels in society. They are educated, but find themselves in what is for most of us the most stressful period of life.
“They’re essentially facing a death sentence and will do anything. We should try to convince them rhino horn doesn’t work.” - Pretoria News