Wealthy trophy hunters are paying thousands of pounds to shoot captive lions who are being bred in farms and kept in awful conditions.
The cruel and lucrative industry which is common in South Africa has been exposed by a year-long investigation by former Tory peer Lord Ashcroft.
He has slammed the Government over its failure to ban imported trophy skins and says it is complicit in the trade.
According to Lord Ashcroft’s exposé published in today’s Mail on Sunday, 54 lions were killed in a slaughterhouse at a so-called ‘eco-farm’ in just two days.
Gruesome pictures show their innards and bones scattered all over the floor while other body parts were stacked up in overflowing plastic bags.
Clients are emailed brochures with photos so they can choose a male lion to kill in an enclosed area, paying anywhere between £10,000 to £42,300.
About 80% of ‘canned lion hunting’ takes place in South Africa’s north-west province, according to Lord Ashcroft’s undercover probe named Operation Simba.
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Investigators managed to save an 11-year-old lion called Simba, who was bred in captivity and advertised to hunters from across the world.
Mugaba Safaris, owned and run by professional hunter Patrick de Beer, described Simba as ‘a very good cat with a dense mane’ in a WhatsApp message.
De Beer told The Mail on Sunday their hunts comply with rules governing the conduct of a chase.
The hunt was due to take place in October at Kalahari Lion Hunting Safaris, owned by Freddie Scheepers, before investigators ‘backed out’ of the deal.
Simba was instead offered to Miles Wakefield, from Essex, who paid around £3,000 to chase Simba through an enclosed hunting ground before shooting him with two strong tranquiliser darts.
Mr Wakefield, 48, who works for an insurance company in London, said he had been ‘misled’ by the hunt organisers, claiming he thought he was aiding a legal conservation operation.
Lord Ashcroft’s team later fought a two month battle trying to free Simba from Scheeper’s ranch near the border with Botswana.
Investigators paid the ranch $2,000 (£1,500) and a transport company and a vet came to the ranch this week to humanely sedate Simba and take him on an 11-hour journey.
A video shows him being released in a secret area of South Africa as one of the rescuers shouts ‘Yay Simba!’
Under South African law, lions can only be shot with tranquiliser darts for ‘for veterinary, scientific, conservation or management purposes’ under the supervision of a vet.
Investigators say 12,000 lions have been bred and raised in the farms, outnumbering wild lions in South Africa almost four to one.
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South Africa is the only country in the world that permits large-scale lion breeding, with about 200 farms and compounds spread across the country.
In a bid to make even more money, South African breeders are believed to be cross-breeding lions and tigers.
The process which can lead to birth defects and early deaths but it boosts the weight of the hybrid cats’ bones meaning more ‘medicine’ can be made from them.
British tourists might unknowingly be helping the industry by posing for photos with lion cubs who are taken away from their mothers at only a few days old.
In a tape recorded phone call, Adrian Sailor, the UK representative for Settlers Safaris in South Africa, offered advice to investigators on how to illegally smuggle a dead lion.
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He advised a body could legally be exported to the UK then put inside the skin of a red deer and illegally smuggled to the US.
He said salting the stag cadaver would make it ‘rock hard’, making it almost impossible for customs officers to find out what’s inside.
France and the US banned the importation of captive-bred lion trophies in 2015 and 2016.
Now Lord Ashcroft says he will ‘vigorously lobby’ ministers to follow in the two countries’ footsteps.
In messages to The Mail on Sunday, Mr Sailor did not deny giving the advice but stressed he was not involved in the hunt the conversation referred to.
He said ‘no crime has been committed’ and added: ‘How will a lion fit inside a deer skin? Major size difference. I have no idea about any recordings.’
The investigation has put the Government under the spotlight over loopholes allowing the importation of hunting trophies.
A source close to Environment Secretary Michael Gove said he would chair a meeting on the issue within the next couple of weeks.
