[Oman-L] Oman's Arabian Oryx sanctuary removed from UNESCO's world heritage list

[Joachim Duester]

Peter Hinchcliffe, who worked with the former
British Aden administration in the then Western Aden
Protectorate 1961-67 and throughout his subsequent
career in HM Diplomatic Service 1969-1997 was Consul
General in Dubai and British Ambassador to Kuwait and
Jordan, kindly gave permission to post the following
comment which he originally sent to another mailing
list. 

"This is very sad. As Political officer in South
Arabia/South Yemen in the early 1960s I recall that 
one of my colleagues based in Makallah was 
involved in an expedition to rescue the last three
(known)oryx in the wild in the Arabian Peninsular.
(See Tony Shepherds's wonderful book: The Flight
of the Unicorn) They were transported to Arizona and 
grew into a viable herd and then returned to Oman 
to be under the care of a tribe the Harasis 
who were to protect them in exchange for a subsidy.
With the death of the Sultan's environmental adviser, 
Ralph Daly (a former political officer in South 
Arabia) I fear that the control from the centre has
gone despite Sultan Qabuus' enthusiasm for the 
project.

Some of the revived herd are in Jordan in the 'Badia'
Hopefully they will be better protected although the
protected area is too small to allow much 
expansion-there were plans when I was in Jordan last
year to move some elsewhere -possibly to Wadi Rum 
but that will be difficult to police especially with
the risk of trigger happy hunters coming in from the 
Kingdom to the south.

Peter Hinchcliffe (Edinburgh)"

P.S. As Peter mentions the late Ralph Daly, you may
wish to read the obituary at
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/global/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/global/2006/12/08/db0802.xml



--- Joachim Duester <jduester at oman.org> wrote:

> UNESCO published a press release on 28 June 2007
> declaring that Oman's Arabian Oryx Sanctuary is 
> to be removed from the UNESCO's World Heritage 
> List.
> 
> For the text of the press release, see
> http://whc.unesco.org/en/news/362
>
> [...]