Poachers have broken through two fences to shoot a four-year old Rhino at a zoo near Paris and use a hacksaw to take his horn. Such booty is worth as much as $100,000 US on the black market because of deep superstition about its power as an aphrodisiac. The crime has shocked the wildlife world and today the head of Britain’s National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU) said the French attack, the first of its kind in Europe, was a wake-up call, and urgent security checks needed to be made to protect the 111 rhinos in captivity in the UK. There was apparently no guard at the Paris zoo. The Zoological Society of London (ZSL) said it has a herd of greater one-horned rhinos and white rhinos at Whipsnade zoo in Bedfordshire and was increasing security patrols following the French attack.
