World Fails to Ban International Trade in Polar Bear Parts

A U.S. proposal to ban the international commercial trade in polar bear parts was defeated last week by parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). Countries voted to allow the destructive polar bear rug trade, primarily through Canada, to continue, despite strong support from Russia of the U.S.-backed ban.

About 800 polar bears are killed by hunters every year, primarily in the Canadian Arctic; half of these bears' skins end up in international trade. Because polar bears are coming under severe pressure from sea-ice melt caused by climate change, and are unlikely to survive under multiple threats, in 2012 the Center for Biological Diversity formally requested that the United States sanction Canada for violating the 1973 Agreement on the Conservation of Polar Bears -- a treaty that prohibits polar bear hunting unless conducted under "sound conservation practices."

"The world failed polar bears today," the Center's Sarah Uhlemann said of the ban's failure in Bangkok. "But the United States has other avenues to pressure Canada to curtail its unsustainable hunt. We urge the Obama administration to act quickly to impose trade sanctions as required by U.S. law."

Read more in Discovery News and then take action today to save polar bears at SavethePolarBear.org.