60 NGOs are participating in the campaign

Events and pictures ... Ugandan activists resort to the European Union to save the chimpanzee forest

• Danger threatens chimpanzee life in the forest.

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• Researchers have discovered an outbreak of human viruses that kill chimpanzees.

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Ugandan activists are pressing for European Union support in a campaign to stop the removal of part of the country's third largest forest, which is home to chimpanzees, forest elephants, and rare and unique plant species.

The "Bloomberg" news agency quoted the chairman of the "Save Bujuma Forest" campaign, Dickens Kamogisha, as saying that environmentalists want the European Union, which is a major funder of government environmental agencies, to put pressure on the authorities to reverse the decision to remove 8,000 hectares (19). One thousand and 768 acres) of Bujuma forest, which has an area of ​​41 thousand hectares and cultivates sugar cane.

Nearly 60 NGOs are participating in the campaign, and Kamujisha said diplomatic intervention could help hold a speedy court hearing to challenge an approved assessment of the project's environmental and social impact, and speed up investigations into the way government officials issued land titles.

"We want the European Union to help us access the maps, engage the government in conducting an independent survey, and work with the justice and law and order sector to ensure that our cases are heard quickly by the courts," Kamogisha said.

Researchers had discovered outbreaks of human viruses that killed chimpanzees in Uganda. Less than two years after the first report on wild chimpanzees in Uganda, and their death due to the "common cold" virus, a study revealed the presence of two other viruses of human origin in groups of chimpanzees in the same forest, The researchers said the new virus outbreak coincided with a deadly one.

This virus outbreak affected different chimpanzee communities in the same forest at the same time.

A group of 205 chimpanzees, known as Ngogo, in the Keppel National Reserve in Uganda, have been severely affected, with about 44% suffering from respiratory diseases, and 25 monkeys from this group died during the outbreak of viruses, while the other group of chimpanzees, known as Kanyawara, It consists of 55 animals, and it witnessed a wide spread of viruses, as more than 69% of the animals were affected by respiratory diseases.

And unlike the Ngogo group, no animal in the Kanyawara group died of these diseases.

Professor Tony Goldberg at the University of Wisconsin-Madison said, "These viruses are very common human, and they spread all over the world, and cause colds in children."

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