Tributes paid to 'silent hero' wildlife conservationist killed in Tanzania

Government officials and fellow conservationists paid tribute to Wayne Lotter at a special memorial yesterday

Hundreds of people gathered at Baobab Village in Dar es Salaam to pay tribute to Wayne Lotter on Tuesday evening, as tributes continued to come in from around the world.

Lotter, 51, was shot and killed last week while travelling in a taxi from the airport to his hotel on Dar es Salaam's Msasani Peninsula. Lotter, who co-founded PAMS Foundation, a conservation nonprofit, was responsible for supporting anti-poaching efforts that had led to the arrests of more than 2000 ivory poachers and traffickers, and had taken down several key poaching syndicates in the country. He had received numerous death threats since starting the organization in 2009.