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Survival strikes at Botswana

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Survival strikes at Botswana
Survival International is urging travellers to stay away from Botswana due to its controversial treatment of its indigenous Bushmen population. The human rights charity is calling for a boycott of the popular safari destination and has received celebrity endorsement from actor Joanna Lumley, illustrator Sir Quentin Blake and musician Julian Lennon, son of John. Two decades ago the Botswana government began a controversial process of "relocating" Bushmen from their ancestral land in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, a protected area roughly the size of Slovakia. The government claims it moved the indigenous hunter-gatherers to preserve the reserve, which is home to wildlife including cheetahs, leopards and lions. However, critics believe there’s a more insidious reason for the controversial relocation programme. “We and many of the Bushmen have always thought that diamond finds beneath the Kalahari were behind the evictions,” said Mike Hurran, a campaigner for Survival International. The government has denied there is a link between the diamond reserves and its controversial relocation programme, which has forced Botswana’s Bushmen to adopt more modern lives in resettlement camps. Tlhalefang Galetshipe is one of the Bushmen who has been resettled. “We said that we didn’t want to abandon our culture here and…

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