———- Forwarded message ———-
From: DawnWatch – news [at] dawnwatch.com
Date: Mar 21, 2007 2:01 PM
Subject: DawnWatch: Anderson Cooper on animals — 3/19 — 3/21/07 Please send thanks.

Photo via jvoves

Thank heavens for CNN’s Anderson Cooper. As he covered the Tsunami, he included the plight of the animals. He covers the effect of war on animals. And after Katrina hit, more than any other reporter, he kept us abreast of the animal situation. This week, as he covers the horror of trafficking in Thailand, naturally he has not forgotten the animals.

His website promo for tonight’s show, Wednesday, March 21, is:

“See the soft underbelly of an ugly black market where endangered animals and animal parts are illegally purchased. A shocking look through the lens of our hidden camera. We’re live from Southeast Asia tonight, 10 ET.”

He already started to explore the issue on Monday. Here is some of the transcript from that coverage:

“On the weekend, in Bangkok’s Jatujak Market, you can find every kind of animal for sale. Most of the trade is legal. But, among these shops and stalls, there is a far more sinister trade as well: wildlife traffickers buying and selling endangered and threatened species. Using an undercover camera, we discover in one store endangered tortoises smuggled in from Madagascar. Here are rare marmosets and lemurs, in this cage, a slow loris, a primate nearly drive to extinction in Thailand.

“The illegal trade of animals is a booming business, worth anywhere from $8 billion to $20 billion annually. And Thailand has become a major hub. Endangered animals like these are sold as pets or smuggled illegally to China and America.

He tells us:

“In 2006, Thai police estimate they recaptured some 10,000 wild animals. But that — that’s just a small fraction of the illegal animal trade.

Wildlife experts estimate, as many as a million animals are illegally traded through Thailand every year.”

He finds an illegal warehouse with “a number of birds” and says, “The birds are kept in poor conditions, sporadically fed, with little water. Many have died in their cages or are close to death.”

Then later:

“We move down the street, find what feels like more of a sophisticated operation. It’s only a matter of minutes in the store when a mother and daughter team pull out a crate brimming with cat pelts. Most of what they show us are endangered: spotted leopard, the mysterious clouded leopard, even jungle cats. Their asking prices range from just a few hundred dollars to a few thousand dollars, depending on the quality of the pelt and the rarity of the species. We tell her we’re not interested, but it’s likely someone will be and unlikely, if they buy these pelts, they’ll get caught.

“During our day in the market we never saw one police officer or even one wildlife official. As we crossed back into Thailand, there were no searches. No one even checked our backpacks.”

You can read Monday’s whole transcript on line at transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0703/19/acd.01.html.

You can read more on Cooper’s blog, at www.CNN.com/360blog , including a disturbing and touching story headed, “Doctor fixes elephants maimed by mines.”

And you can watch more on the illegal wildlife trade on Anderson Cooper 360 tonight.

Please make sure that Anderson Cooper knows that we don’t take for granted his regular coverage of animal issues. Positive feedback from viewers gives reporters license to focus on these issues. So please send a quick appreciative note at www.cnn.com/feedback/forms/form5.ac.html?10.

Feedback matters!

Yours and the animals’,
Karen Dawn

(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at www.DawnWatch.com. You may forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts if you do so unedited — leave DawnWatch in the title and include this parenthesized tag line. If somebody forwards DawnWatch alerts to you, which you enjoy, please help the list grow by signing up. It is free.)

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Tagged: animals animal rights animal welfare environment environmental environmentalism environmentalist action alerts dawnwatch anderson cooper anderson cooper 360 cnn the silver fox southeast asia black market endangered species endangered animals conservation wildlife animal smuggling wildlife trafficking men i love

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 21st, 2007 at 8:21 pm and is filed under Action Alerts, Animals as..., Conservation (Wildlife), food, from DawnWatch, In the News, pets. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.