By Mark Jenkins | Photograph by Brent Stirton |  Emmanuel de Merode is a man on a dangerous mission: to save Congo’s mountain gorillas, one of the most imperiled creatures on Earth. There are only about 720 mountain gorillas left on the planet, 200 of which live in war-ravaged Virunga National Park in the far eastern corner of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (the other 500 thrive just across the border in peaceful Uganda and Rwanda, and lure millions in tourist dollars each year).  In 2007 ten of Virunga’s precious mountain gorillas were murdered. Shortly after the killings, I went to eastern Congo to report from the field for National Geographic. After months of investigation, unbelievably, the then director of the park, Honoré Mashagiro, the man whose sworn duty was to protect Virunga, was implicated in the murders. Fired by the Congolese park service, Mashagiro is now being tried in court. De Merode, a 38-year-old Belgian anthropologist, replaced Mashagiro in August 2008 and inherited more mortally serious problems than any park warden in the world.

“I am under no illusions about the difficulties,” he said recently, during a phone interview from Congo. It was midnight his time, and he’d spent the entire day tracking gorillas. “At present the central and eastern sectors of the park are essentially a no-man’s-land, infected by rebel forces who are shooting elephants for bush meat.”

De Merode is an understated but indefatigably forceful man. Before being named park director, he had worked in Virunga for seven years, then joined with renowned conservationist Richard Leakey to form WildlifeDirect, an NGO focused on protecting the mountain gorillas. If there’s any man alive who can save Virunga, it’s de Merode. But the task is unimaginably daunting.

Virunga is ground zero for the current insurgency in Congo’s decade-long war, whose origins can be traced to the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Hutu tribesmen butchered some 800,000 Tutsis before the rule of law was reestablished and the Hutus fled west, crossing the border into Congo. Ten years later, a self-proclaimed savior named Laurent Nkunda, a rogue general with ties to the Rwandan military, formed his own guerrilla army bent on either killing the génocidaires or bringing them to justice. Secretly sponsored by Rwanda, Nkunda’s rebels have been waging war against not only the Hutus in Virunga, but also against the Congolese army. Over 120 Virunga rangers have been killed in the past decade, caught in the cross fire of poachers, rebels, and the military—the highest death toll for any national park in the world.

This is an exercerpt from a special report on the National Geographic Adventure Website. To read the full story go to http://adventure.nationalgeographic.com/2009/03/special-report/congo-gorillas/mark-jenkins-text

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