Conservationists hail US plan to ban shark fin trade

Biden poised to sign measure into law as US faces criticism at Cop15 biodiversity conference over failing to sign 30-year-old pact to protect nature

As the UN meets in Montreal to discuss saving biodiversity without the US, whose representatives are joining only as observers, conservationists are hailing one American step in the right direction: a likely ban on the trade of shark fins.

Although shark finning - the practice of cutting off shark fins and dumping the rest of the body back into the ocean - is illegal in the US, much of the trade in fins happens in US territory. As many as 73 million sharks are finned around the world each year.