Sri Lankan President intervenes to resolve human-elephant conflict
[June 14, 2001]

The two-member presidential 'fact-finding' committee appointed to look into the human-elephant conflict in Sri Lanka is now touring Anuradhapura in north-central Sri Lanka where 32 elephants have been killed so far this year.

Former Director of Wildlife, Lyn de Alwis and a prominent elephant expert Jayantha Jayawardene, have been appointed by President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga to a presidential committee appointed to investigate the human-elephant conflict.

Interviewed by PRIU, Jayantha Jayawardene said, "Our mission is to look for practical and lasting solutions to the human-elephant conflict, which has drastically reduced the elephant population in Sri Lanka over the past few years."

"We have had discussions with the government officials in the area and we are looking for long and short term solutions to this problem," Jayawardene added.

The Sri Lankan government has taken a number of measures towards the protection of the wildlife and the upgrading to a high standard of the National Parks and the Zoological Gardens.

Under this new programme training will be provided to the villagers on protection of wildlife as well as protecting themselves from the wildlife.

"Special attention has been paid by the President on the elephants as well as the human life and cultivation being destroyed by the elephant-man conflict now being reported from various parts of the island," a press release issued on Tuesday by the Presidential Secretariat stated.

According to the Department of Wildlife Conservation, the number of elephant deaths reported during the year 2000 was 156.

The Department of Wildlife Conservation said that elephants get killed due to human-elephant conflict and natural causes. But the most number of elephant deaths reported is due to the war in the north and east of the country.

Last year, government forces and rebels were engaged in a fierce battle for control of Elephant Pass – a thin strip of land between the lagoon and the sea earlier used by elephants to cross over to the northern Jaffna peninsula.

A spokesman for Wildlife Conservation told PRIU, "A large number of elephants die due to the explosion of land mines in the conflict zone."

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Udawalawa National Park said that it will be opened for public from tomorrow. The park has been closed down for public for over a period of one-month following the elephant attack, which killed a guide.

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Last Updated Date: December 17, 2003 .