It was a routine patrol around 7:30 a.m. Sunday when six rangers working in Virunga National Park in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo were ambushed by a group of local militias. The attack is the latest in the eastern part of the Congo to host some of the world’s last mountain gorillas.
“It’s devastating,” park director Emmanuel De Merode told CBS News as he left the funeral of one of his six rangers. “The families of these men have lost their livelihoods and have no safety net.”
STRINGER / REUTERS
And for those left behind it is a brutal blow to morale.
The attack is the deadliest since April last year, when 17 people (12 of them rangers) were killed in the worst episode of violence in the park’s history. De Merode himself survived an assassination attempt after being shot several times in the chest and abdomen in 2014.
The Congolese Institute for Nature Conservation, the agency that manages the country’s protected areas, says the latest attack came as guards patrolled the central sector of the park, near an electric fence. new construction designed to prevent intrusions into the protected area. The rangers have been very successful (it has kept the militia out of the area), but that success has put a goal in their head.
Armed fighters were not poachers, but militiamen fighting for control of natural resources and land. Park rangers are frequently attacked as part of the ongoing power war in eastern Congo. Dozens of armed groups operate in the region, many remnants of militias that fought in civil wars over the past three decades that have resulted in millions of deaths from conflict, famine and disease.
Jerome Delay / AP
Militia groups hiding in the Virunga forest believe the parks have taken up too much land for the conservation of animals and land they need to survive. But it is not hand-to-hand survival: the Virunga forest is rich in natural resources such as charcoal, forests, fishing from the lake, animals and land. De Merode said this is a lucrative business for the militia.
“The park is very rich in resources and we lose about $ 170 million a year with these illegal activities,” he said. “This is what attracts the militia to the park. Our job is to protect the park, but it also means cutting them off large sums of money and bringing them into frequent conflict with the guards whose job it is to protect the reserve. and their flagship species, the mountain gorillas. ”
The attack has been blamed on Mai-Mai, a general term that refers to the numerous militias waging an armed conflict in the region. They finance their activities with illegal looting of resources and are small but well armed.
The Virunga Game Reserve is one of the oldest parks in Africa, with stunning scenery, incredible biodiversity and, of course, the majestic mountain gorilla. The park offers a rare opportunity to see these creatures up close.
Before the global coronavirus pandemic, the park was on its way to becoming an economic asset. In an attempt to reduce violence, authorities have created nearly 12,000 jobs and at least 11% of these new employees are former militiamen. Authorities hope that if they can give the fighters a sustainable job, it can end the conflict.
But the parks have suffered a series of devastating blows in recent years: a recent Ebola outbreak, the coronavirus pandemic and now another brutal attack. The lack of tourism in this deadly cocktail of events has decimated the industry. De Merode said he doesn’t know how long they can last financially.
“It could take weeks,” he said. “At best, a few months.”