ABSTRACT
Kahuzi Beiga [national park in eastern Congo] was the birthplace of gorilla tourism and the place where Dian Fossey, the anthropologist and subject of the film Gorillas in the Mist, first encountered the highland gorilla…. But in the 1990s the park’s once healthy population of gorillas has been severely reduced by poachers and Rwandan rebels, who use it as a hideout…. Twenty gorillas have been killed since April, and the days when tourists rubbed shoulders and shook hands with these magnificent creatures are now long gone…. Basengezi Katintima, the governor of South Kiva province, where the park is situated, said: ‘In Rwanda they are talking about a human genocide, but here we are talking about an animal genocide.’
