'Battle For The Elephants' Follows Global Ivory Trade And Its Effect On Vulnerable Species (VIDEO)

The "Battle for the Elephants" crew takes a break with members of the Maasai at Amboseli National Park, Kenya. (Photo courtesy of John Heminway and J.J. Kelley for National Geographic Television.)

A new special from National Geographic Television and PBS explores the brutal ivory trade and its effect on Africa's elephant populations. "Battle for the Elephants," which airs February 27 on PBS, follows journalists Bryan Christy and Aidan Hartley as they track the ivory trade from Tanzania to China.

"You can smell it; it’s almost like dried blood," Hartley described while visiting the world's largest stockpile of ivory tusks in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Walking among 90 metric tons of ivory valued at $50 million, he added, "There is the smell of death in here. All of these are confiscated trophies."

Writer, producer and director John Heminway said in a press release, “If the current situation remains the status quo, we are facing the very real possibility that elephants living in the wild will go extinct in the coming decades." He added, "The market for smuggled ivory is too lucrative for poachers to resist, and our research suggests demand for ivory in China is only going to rise.”

The International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species classifies African elephants (Loxodonta africana) as "vulnerable." According to the organization, illegal hunting remains a factor in areas like Central Africa, but "the most important perceived threat is the loss and fragmentation of habitat."

National Geographic notes in the press release that "Battle for the Elephants" was funded in part by billionaire businessman David Koch. Koch was among a number of celebrities in attendance at a February screening of the special. He has abstained from hunting "since 1965 because of his sympathy for animals," reported The New York Times.

Although the Washington Post reports Koch's $35 million donation to the National Museum of Natural History in 2012 was the fifth-largest single donation in Smithsonian history, the oil executive has faced criticism for his environmental stances and for shrugging off climate science.

The underworld of illegal ivory trafficking was also explored last year in the Discovery Channel's "Ivory Wars." Discovery producers went undercover in a market in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. The show's narrator explained, "it may already be too late" for elephants in the DRC, "thanks to deforestation, consumption of elephant meat and a lax policy on ivory sales."

"Battle for the Elephants" premieres on PBS on Wednesday, February 27 at 9PM EST.

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World Trade Center Bombing: Lessons From '93 On Extremist Threat

NEW YORK -- It had to be an accident.

Though hard to imagine now, that was the prevailing theory moments after an explosion rocked the World Trade Center around noon on a chilly Feb. 26, 1993.

The truth – that a cell of Islamic extremists had engineered a car-bomb attack that killed six people, injured more than 1,000 and caused more than a half-billion dollars in damage – "was incomprehensible at the time," recalled FBI agent John Anticev.

On the eve of the 20-year anniversary of the bombing, Anticev and other current and former law enforcement officials involved in the case reflected on an event that taught them tough lessons about a dire threat from jihadists. That threat, now seared into the city's psyche because of the Sept. 11 attacks, felt vague and remote two decades ago.

"In those days, terrorism wasn't the first reaction," said former federal prosecutor David Kelley.

The scale of the attack was the first dramatic demonstration that "terrorism is theater and New York is the biggest stage," said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.

A two-time commissioner, Kelly was serving his first stint when the initial report that came in to police that day that there was an apparent transformer explosion at the trade center.

Kelly raced to the scene, where the bomb planted in a parked Ryder van had left a crater half the size of a football field in the trade center garage. For the first time since it opened in 1973, the trade center stood in the darkness that night.

"I remember seeing this tremendous sea of first-responder vehicles ... and smoke was coming out," Kelly said.

The commissioner gathered with other police and federal officials in a nearby hotel conference room to assess the damage. The meeting didn't last long because an engineer warned "the floor could collapse at any time," Kelly said.

A day later, after a utility mishap was ruled out, authorities "started to come to the conclusion it was bomb," Kelly said.

Anticev and other FBI agents were initially assigned to pursue rumors that the twin towers may have been attacked in retaliation for the U.S. bombing of Serbia. But the probe took a dramatic turn after investigators found a vehicle identification number on a piece of the blown-up van.

Investigators later learned that the renter of the van wanted to get his deposit back after reporting it stolen – a break that sounded too good to be true.

"I was betting he wouldn't show up," said Kelley.

The renter, Mohammed Salameh, indeed appeared to demand his deposit about a week after the blast.

When Anticev heard Salameh's name, "I really almost started to cry," the agent recalled.

His dismay was well-earned. He had long been watching Salameh and other radical Muslims in the FBI's investigation of the assassination of Jewish Defense League founder Meir Kahane at a Manhattan hotel.

The FBI knew the men had practiced together shooting guns and assembling pipe bombs. But in the summer of 1992, investigators lost an informant who possibly could have warned of the more ambitious plot, Anticev said.

A pipe-bomb attack "was as big a plot as we thought they were capable of," he said.

In hindsight, Anticev believes agents were "too Western" in their attempts to neutralize the budding terrorists before they struck.

He described using tough interrogation tactics that would have spooked ordinary criminals – obtaining subpoenas and bringing them in for questioning in rooms where they purposely displayed surveillance photos of them on the wall.

"We thought they would be chilled by that experience," he said. "But it was like water off a duck's back. That did not scare them at all. They just did it anyway. ... That was a big lesson."

Kelly believes because the suspects were quickly rounded up, in some circles they "were written off as this inept group of zealots," Kelly said. "It was not seen was not seen as the global conspiracy it turned out to be."

The probe of the attack led to convictions of Salameh and three other men and the later the capture Ramzi Yousef, the leader of the attack. Investigators learned that the highly educated Yousef had tried to detonate the car bomb in way that would cause countless casualties by toppling one of the towers into the other and bringing them down like giant dominos, and watch with disappointment from the banks of the Hudson River in New Jersey when it didn't happen.

Yousef is the nephew of Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Even after Yousef was found guilty in a Manhattan courtroom and put away for life, "we really didn't know what was ahead," said Kelley, who was part of the prosecution team. "This was before everybody was on to bin Laden."

Police Commissioner Kelly remembered that in 1993, while surveying the destruction in the underground garage, an engineer told him that the buildings would never come down.

"On Sept. 11," Kelly said, "the thought of that came back to me."

___

Associated Press writer Larry Neumeister contributed to this report.

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Tomato Deal Reached Between U.S., Mexico, Averting Trade War

(Adds reaction, more detail on pact)

* Deal raises minimum "reference" price for Mexican tomatoes

* Agreement expected to take effect on March 4

By Doug Palmer

WASHINGTON, Feb 2 (Reuters) - The U.S. government and Mexican tomato growers reached a tentative agreement on Saturday that reduces the threat of a costly trade war stemming from a U.S. decision last year to pull out of a 1996 bilateral tomato trade pact.

"I am pleased that we were able to come to an agreement on fresh tomato imports from Mexico that restores stability and confidence to the U.S. tomato market and meets the requirements of U.S. law,"€? U.S. Commerce Under Secretary for International Trade Francisco Sanchez said in a statement.

The draft agreement substantially raises the minimum "reference" price at which Mexican plum, cherry and other tomatoes can be sold in the United States and accounts for changes that have occurred in the tomato market since the original agreement, Sanchez said.

For some Mexican tomatoes, the new reference price is more than double the current such price, Sanchez said. The deal is expected to take effect on March 4, after a public comment period, he said.

Mexican Economy Minister Ildefonso Guajardo said the deal guaranteed Mexican farmers access to the U.S. market under conditions that were "fair and competitive."

"We worked hand in hand with Mexican producers on this agreement to avoid damage to the sector," he said.

The U.S. Commerce Department made a preliminary decision in September to terminate the 1996 tomato agreement after Florida growers complained that the arrangement no longer protected them against Mexican tomatoes sold below the cost of production.

That angered Mexican growers, who argued the pact had benefited U.S. consumers and brought stability to the North American market.

Mexican officials said the U.S. move appeared designed to help President Barack Obama carry Florida in his election battle against Republican Mitt Romney. Obama won the state in the November contest.

Mexico exports about $1.9 billion worth of tomatoes to the United States each year. Varieties include common round, cherry, grape, plum, greenhouse and pear tomatoes. The industry says Florida producers have not kept pace with new growing techniques that produce tastier tomatoes and have propelled Mexican sales.

FOUR CATEGORIES

The proposed agreement spares Mexican growers from having to wage a costly legal battle against a new anti-dumping case brought by Florida producers.

It also averts the possibility of a broader trade war. U.S. business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce feared Mexico could retaliate if the United States slapped hefty duties on Mexican tomatoes.

Reggie Brown, executive vice president of the Florida Tomato Exchange, stopped short of endorsing the agreement but said it vindicated the U.S. industry's position that Mexican growers were "dumping" their tomatoes in the United States.

"Mexican growers and their government have tried to protect their interests with tremendous pressure on our government, threats to U.S. producers and a well-funded lobbying and media campaign," Brown said.

"The facts, however, were clear and could not be disputed. Mexican tomatoes were being sold in the U.S. market in rapidly increasing volumes at prices that did not reflect the cost of production," he said.

The new pact sets reference prices for four categories of tomatoes, instead of just one under the current pact. It also broadens coverage to include essentially all Mexican growers and exporters, the Commerce Department said.

The four categories, from least to most expensive, are "open field and adapted environment" tomatoes, "controlled environment" tomatoes, "specialty loose" tomatoes and "specialty packed" tomatoes.

The agreement sets winter and summer references prices for each category. The winter prices range from 31 cents per pound for open field and adapted environment tomatoes to 59 cents for specialty packed. The summer prices range from 24.6 cents to 46.8 cents per pound.

The single reference price for all Mexican tomatoes under the current agreement is 21.6 cents per pound in the winter and 17.2 cents in the summer. (Reporting by Doug Palmer; Additional reporting by Dave Graham in Mexico City; Editing by Eric Beech)

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Senators Trade Proposals Into Night To Avoid 'Fiscal Cliff'

Senate negotiators labored late into Saturday over a last-ditch plan to avert the "fiscal cliff," struggling to resolve key differences over how many wealthy households should face higher income taxes in the new year and how to tax inherited estates.

Read the whole story at The Washington Post

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