African Parks Networks Announces Series of Investigative Reports on Poaching by CNN News Team

Peter Fearnhead, the Chief Executive Officer of the African Parks Network, put out this press release today with news about several upcoming CNN news reports on poaching in the Odzala-Kokoua National Park.  The press release is below:
Dear All,
A senior CNN investigative and reporting team visited Odzala-Kokoua National Park at the end of last year to cover a series of issues including African Parks’ ground-breaking amnesty and training programme for former poachers, the role of the Chinese in illegal ivory trading, and the conservation of elephants and gorillas at Odzala.
The CNN team have produced five three-to-five minutes news reports for CNN TV International (each gets several repeat screenings) and a half-hour documentary special on the conservation of Odzala’s gorillas and elephants called CNN’s Inside Africa. Details follow below. The first three news segments have screened so far and have now been also posted by CNN on their website www.cnn.com
· News report one: The uncovering of the poachers’ camp by the Odzala team with CNN as they were travelling down the river, during the course of which the CNN team was fired at
· News report two: The tracking of the poachers using the mobile phone that was discovered in the abandoned poachers’ camp which provided an invaluable trail and the poachers’ network
· News report three: An overall look at Yengo check-point, the concentration of Chinese in the region, and their involvement in illegal ivory trading/poaching
· News report four: The ground-breaking Amnesty and Training for former poachers at Odzala, including the Pygmy member in its midst, and the nearby Pgymy community and their marginalised position as a group in the Congo
· News report five: An overall look at Odzala from a conservation perspective including the park’s crucial role in conserving gorillas and elephant
· Half hour conservation documentary on CNN’s Inside Africa TV programme
The above news reports have either been or will be repeated several times on air. In addition, Arwa Damon, CNN’s Senior International Correspondent, who led the Odzala reports, is currently also being interviewed herself in London by CNN anchor Becky Anderson and others about the “stories behind the stories” i.e. how they got the stories, what they had to go through to report on and film the material in which Odzala is likely to feature. Material on CNN’s TV news and documentary programmes is generally posted on the CNN website www.cnn.com 48 hours after it has screened on TV.
The links to the first three news reports screened on CNN International are as follows:
1) Poachers are the Prey: http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/06/world/africa/congo-poacher-camp-bust/index.html
2) Chinese construction camps conduits in ivory trade: http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/08/world/africa/congo-chinese-ivory/index.html
3) Gorilla conservation: http://edition.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/international/2014/01/06/spc-inside-africa-western-lowland-gorillas-a.cnn.html
Best regards
Peter Fearnhead
Chief Executive Officer
African Parks Network
Block B, 5 Lone Close,
Lonehill Office Park,
PO Box 2336
Lonehill 2062
South Africa
t: +27 11 465 0050 (office)
f: +27 86 662 4992 (fax)
www.african-parks.org
www.facebook.com/africanparksnetwork
www.youtube.com/user/africanparksnetwork