A court in Uganda has sentenced an ivory trader to life in prison, the longest sentence for such crimes in the country's history. According to the BBC, a new law was passed in the year 2019 that tightened jail sentences for poaching or smuggling endangered species.
The man named Pascal Ochiba got arrested in January this year with two pieces of ivory weighing over 10 kg. The magistrate also ruled that Ochiba, a repeat criminal, deserved life in jail for the protection of animals in the future, the outlet further reported.
According to a release from the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), Gladys Kamasanyu, the chief magistrate of the country's special wildlife court, remarked in the passing sentence that "offences of unlawful possession of protected species are rampant and need to curb them."
As quoted by the BBC, UWA Executive Director Sam Mwandha said, "This is a landmark achievement in our war on illegal wildlife trade in Uganda. We must do our best in our times to protect our wildlife otherwise history will judge us harshly."
The hunter who slaughtered Rafiki, a silverback gorilla, was sentenced to 11 years in jail in the year 2020 while two men who were responsible for the deaths of six endangered tree-climbing lions were sentenced to eight years in prison in September.
In Uganda, there are approximately 7,900 elephants left in the wild, including both forest and savannah elephants. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has classified forest elephants as critically endangered, whereas savannah elephants are categorised as endangered, BBC further reported.
