Lions beheaded in suspected ritual-use poaching incident in Zimbabwe park Lenin Ndebele, News 24 October 23, 2024 In what may be the first time Zimbabwe's Hwange National Park has experienced poaching for ritual purposes, three lions were shot dead at on Monday before they were beheaded and their paws cut off, according to the Zimbabwe National Parks (ZimParks). "The poachers shot them with a heavy-calibre rifle and we suspect the poaching was linked to rituals because of the manner it was done," said ZimParks spokesman Tinashe Farawo. The incident comes as ZimParks reports an increase in what it categorises as human-wildlife conflict, with drought hitting agricultural production while animals roam farther afield as they try to avoid the fate of more than 160 elephants that died last year. "Elephants, lions and the other big five animals have been straying off to human settlements in search of food and water. This has only increased human-to-animal conflicts," Farawo said. Occasionally in Zimbabwe, lions kill people, but the reverse is controversial. In 2015, there was a local and international outcry when the country's most prominent big cat, Cecil The Lion, was baited with an elephant carcass so that a hunter, who paid some R900 000, could shoot him. In 2018, South African wildlife park owner Christa Saayman found six of her lions north of Pretoria with their heads and paws chopped off. According to the Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the global wild African lion population has plummeted to 23 000, down from around 200 000 at the beginning of the last century. Zimbabwe has a lion population of around 2 000 while South Africa has more than 8 000 lions categorised as in captivity, and about 3 500 roaming free. https://www.news24.com/news24/africa/news/lions-beheaded-in-suspected-ritual-use-poaching-incident-in-zimbabwe-park-20241023