Tanzania is reportedly experiencing a major poaching problem, and some of its leaders are going positively Texan in dealing with it. Minister of Natural Resources and Tourism Khamis Kagasheki noted recently that Tanzania may have lost half its elephant population within the past three years, and then essentially advocated a “shoot to kill” policy:

Soft measures, which we witness today, especially with sentencing for those caught poaching, will not deter poachers…Our own teams in Kenya can arrest a poacher one day and then the next week come up against the same poacher, who having paid a small fine was released by the courts – where’s the deterrent?…I am very aware that some alleged human rights activists will make an uproar, claiming that poachers have as much rights to be tried in courts as the next person, but let’s face it, poachers not only kill wildlife but also usually never hesitate to shoot dead any innocent person standing in their way.

That was Friday, October 4, 2013. After only two months, the Tanzanian parliament has reportedly suspended the program, ominously titled Operation Terminate. During that time, police arrested more than 950 poachers and seized around 230 pounds of ivory, also described as 706 elephant tusks. Allegations abound that police are engaging in widespread human rights abuses, including the torture and killing of suspected poachers. Also, they are allegedly conducting illegal seizures of property, which is bad but sort of pales next to the alleged torture & death part.

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