Africa’s Gabon’s Minkebe Park has lost elephants to ivory poaching since 2004, The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) has said Recent surveys of areas within the park revealed that two-thirds of its elephants have vanished since 2004. Gabon contains over half of Africa’s forest elephants, with a population of 40,000.

An estimated 31,800 elephants were lost to poaching last year. Gabon’s National Park Agency reported an uptick of poaching in recent years, including the 2011 slaughter of 27 elephants.

Park authorities estimated that 50-100 elephants were being killed daily due to rising demand for ivory from the Far East.

Gabon’s National Park staff engaged in a fire fight with armed poachers in Minkebe after arresting two persons carrying six tusks.