India's Assam state makes new plans to halt rhino poaching

The newly elected government of the northeast Indian state of Assam has launched plans to crack down on the poaching of the area's famed one-horned rhinos, an official said Saturday.

The state's Kaziranga National Park is home to the world's largest population of the rare rhinos, with more than 2,000 of the species. While overall poaching deaths have dropped over the last few years, a series of rhino killings this year has led the new government to renew anti-poaching efforts.

Kenya burns huge pile of ivory tusks to protest poaching

Kenya's president set fire Saturday to 105 tons of elephant ivory and more than 1 ton of rhino horn, believed to be the largest stockpile ever destroyed, in a dramatic statement by this East African country against the trade in ivory and products from endangered species.

Uhuru Kenyatta put a flame to the biggest of 11 pyres of ivory tusks and one of rhino horn in a chilly afternoon. Overnight torrential rains had threated to ruin the event but stopped midday leaving a mud field around the piles inside Nairobi National Park.

Kenya: Large pyres set up for massive burn of ivory

Kenyan authorities have built towering pyres of more than 100 tons of elephant tusks that will be burned on Saturday, in what wildlife officials believe will be the largest single destruction of ivory in history.

In front of the tusks are illegal ornaments made from ivory, such as a Chinese warrior on horseback with his fist in the air.

As local conservation groups and media visited the ivory-burning site in Nairobi National Park on Thursday, workers were putting the finishing touches to the stacks of ivory as rangers from the Kenya Wildlife Service stood guard nearby.