"It is allowed for people to raise wild animals and keep them if they are brought from abroad,” Hemin Kamar Khan Afandi, media officer of the Sulaimani Forests and Environment Rangers, told Rudaw on Saturday. "But, if they are found to have captured them in Kurdistan, the owners will be held responsible.”
“And we will return them to the wildlife.”
The issue of capturing animals began in 2014 during the war with the Islamic State (ISIS), which forced park rangers to the front lines to fight the militant group, giving illegal hunters open season. Taking animals out of captivity is already illegal, Afandi added.
"We have issued the measures and determined the fines based on Regulation No. 1 of the year 2015 of the [KRG] board," he said.
Afandi said the reason why the wild are always subject to being captured is because "the government has not been able to create some protected areas due to the economic crisis."
"There are certain places where some kinds of animals live, including tiger, but we do not want to disclose the places in order for hunters to not know the place and go hunt them," he added.
In April 2017, the Kurdish-American Organisation secured
the release of six hand-raised Asiatic brown bears into the wilds of Halgord National Park, a wildlife sanctuary in the northeast of the Kurdistan Region.
Though there is not official data about the number of wild animals in the Kurdistan Region, Afandi is optimistic that their number is on the rise.
"The number of wild bucks in Darbandikhan was six in the past. But now, the number has increased to 200 and it is the case in other areas, too,” he said, referring to the large lake south of Suleimani.
Between 2008 and 2010, the KRG introduced environmental protection laws, including some related to hunting, in order to protect the region's wildlife and nature.
The Sulaimani Forest and Environment Police say tough fines will be levied on any poachers killing or poaching wild animals, including lions and tigers.
The fines range from 100,000 Iraqi dinars (around $85) to 10,000,000 Iraqi dinars (around $8,000), according to regulations by the Protection and Improvement section of the Kurdistan Environment Board. According to the regulations, the hunters of tigers, brown bears, black bears, deer, wild sheep and goats will be fined for 10,00,000 dinars.
The hunters of wild boar will be fined for 500,000 dinars (around $415), foxes for 300,000 (around $250) dinars and squirrels for 100,000 dinars (around $85).
The fine is subject to increase if the number of the hunted or captured wild animals is very limited in Kurdistan, Afandi said.
Translated by Zhelwan Z. Wali
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