China Ignores CITES Decisions

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China has entered reservations concerning the listing of the following species in CITES Appendix II : Scalloped hammerhead shark, Sphyrna lewini Porbeagle shark, Lamna nasus

See: http://www.cites.org/eng/notif/2013/E-Notif-2013-011.pdf

In short, this means  China decided that it will not be bound by the decision of the other Parties (member nations) of CITES with regard to the scalloped hammerhead and porbeagle sharks.

China's  reservation was submitted to CITES on February 26, 2013, nearly a month BEFORE the two species were listed on CITES Appendix II. Did China assume the proposals to list  oceanic whitetip sharks and manta rays wouldn’t be accepted by CITES?

Fin traders in Hong Kong were able to identify fins of sharks listed on CITES 100% of the time. But at CITES CoP16, the delegate from China stated his country didn’t have the know-how to do the same. If China lacks the expertise to ID shark fins, why are we still importing chemicals, hardware, phones, electrical machinery and medical equipment from a country which openly admits at an international forum that it lacks capability and competence to ID shark fins?!?