Since the 1960s, over 80 percent of animal species have disappeared in the north of the Central African Republic. Elephants, giraffes and felines are all victims of intensive poaching, facilitated by porous borders with Chad and Sudan and countless infiltrations by rebel groups. In this uncontrollable area, a American NGO signed a 25-year partnership with the government to protect the area from environmental disaster; a challenge that its 150 under-armed men are struggling to meet. But in a decade, these guards have still managed to take back and control a quarter of the protected area, and some animals are gradually returning. Our correspondent Clement Di Roma reports.

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