DINOKENG GAME RESERVE, South Africa (AP) — The Dinokeng Game Reserve in South Africa has a thriving rhino population, but their exact numbers and the details of the security operation that keeps them safe from poaching are closely guarded secrets.
They are the protocols that reserves with rhinos follow to ensure they're not the next target for poachers who still kill on average one rhino every day in South Africa for their horns despite decades of work to save the endangered species.
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Members of the public and volunteers participate in rhino tracking at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, northwest of Nakasongola, Uganda, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Hajarah Nalwadda)
Rhinos rest under a tree at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, northwest of Nakasongola, Uganda, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Hajarah Nalwadda)
Two rhinos rest under a tree at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, northwest of Nakasongola, Uganda, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Hajarah Nalwadda)
Marius Fuls, left, a wildlife monitor, holds an antenna to locate rhinos at the Dinokeng Game Reserve near Hammanskraal, South Africa, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)
Marais Fuls, left, a wildlife monitor, holds an antenna to locate rhinos at the Dinokeng Game Reserve near Hammanskraal, South Africa, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)
A rhino is seen at the Dinokeng Game Reserve near Hammanskraal, South Africa, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)
South Africa has the largest populations of both black and southern white rhinos of any country and sees itself as the custodian of the animals' future.
As conservationists mark World Rhino Day on Monday, South Africa remains in a constant and costly battle against poaching nearly 30 years after black rhinos were declared critically endangered, and more than a half-century since southern white rhinos were on the brink of extinction with just a few dozen left.
South Africa has more than 2,000 of the 6,700 black rhinos left in the wild or in reserves and 12,000-13,000 of the world's 15,000 remaining southern white rhinos, which are now listed as near threatened after a turnaround. Those two species are only found in the wild in Africa. South Africa has a pivotal place in saving them but also is the epicenter of rhino poaching that is linked to organized crime.
South Africa's rhinos are spread between government-run parks and private owners like Dinokeng.
The country has made marked progress in the last decade with that public-private collaboration, bringing the number of rhinos killed by poachers from well over 1,000 every year to 420 last year. Yet, 195 rhinos were killed by poachers in the first half of this year, according to the South African Environment Ministry, still one every day.
“Please do not tell a ranger that we’re not going to win this war,” said Marius Fuls, a wildlife monitor and ranger at Dinokeng. "If we as conservationists stop believing that we’re going to win this, then we have lost it. We’re the last thin green line between the extinction of rhinos.”
In South Africa and elsewhere, anti-poaching efforts now employ high-tech tactics to help rangers. Reserves are using drones, night surveillance equipment, radar technology, motion-sensing cameras and artificial intelligence. Rhinos at Dinokeng are fitted with tracking devices so rangers know where they are. Rangers also patrol with K-9 dog units.
Dinokeng has been successful in protecting its rhinos, but there is no letup. “It would be naive to think that poaching is not a threat even though we haven’t had incidents in many years," Fuls said. "Poaching is always a threat."
Some reserves continue to dehorn their rhinos to make them useless to poachers who kill them because of the high demand for rhino horn products for medicinal and other uses in parts of Asia. Studies indicate that rhino horn products sold through illegal markets sometimes fetch higher prices than gold.
The fight against poaching is always looking for new ways to stop rhinos being killed. This year, a group of scientists in South Africa working with the International Atomic Energy Agency launched a program to inject small amounts of radioactive material into rhinos' horns. The aim is to make them unsellable, but also detectable if they are smuggled through borders.
The scientists said the radioactive material does not harm the rhinos.
Conservationists are also moving rhinos to new areas in a repeat of South Africa's famous Operation Rhino of the 1960s. That operation was a reaction to the drastic situation of southern white rhinos, which were nearly extinct. It moved some of the last remaining white rhinos in eastern South Africa to other areas so they could be better protected and establish new breeding populations. It is credited with saving the southern white rhino.
Several conservation organizations are doing that again now, both in South Africa and elsewhere.
One of them is Peace Parks Foundation, which has sent nearly 50 black and white rhinos to the Zinave National Park in neighboring Mozambique, a reserve which was decimated by poaching.
The operation — expensive and complicated — has returned rhinos to Zinave for the first time in more than 40 years and the population is already growing, with eight rhino calves born there since the relocation, according to Peace Parks.
"It's been an incredible success story," said Gillian Rhodes, combating wildlife crime program manager at Peace Parks Foundation. But she added rhino poaching rates are still “devastating.”
Similar success in rhino conservation is reported elsewhere in Africa.
The east African nation of Uganda on Monday held its first-ever ceremony to name 17 rhino calves at a sanctuary, an event the head of the country's wildlife agency described as “a powerful statement that Uganda has chosen restoration over despair and resilience over loss.”
Rhinos were hunted to extinction in Uganda, but the species was reintroduced in 1996 and the country is now home to 50, said James Musinguzi, executive director of the Uganda Wildlife Authority.
World Rhino Day was started in 2010 to raise awareness of the threat of poaching and habitat loss for all five of the world's rhino species. The other three, which are found in Asia, are in an even worse predicament. There are just over 4,000 greater one-horned rhinos, only around 50 Javan rhinos and less than 50 Sumatran rhinos left, according to the International Rhino Foundation's latest count.
Imray reported from Cape Town, South Africa.
AP Africa news: https://apnews.com/hub/africa
Members of the public and volunteers participate in rhino tracking at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, northwest of Nakasongola, Uganda, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Hajarah Nalwadda)
Rhinos rest under a tree at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, northwest of Nakasongola, Uganda, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Hajarah Nalwadda)
Two rhinos rest under a tree at the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, northwest of Nakasongola, Uganda, Monday, Sept. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Hajarah Nalwadda)
Marius Fuls, left, a wildlife monitor, holds an antenna to locate rhinos at the Dinokeng Game Reserve near Hammanskraal, South Africa, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)
Marais Fuls, left, a wildlife monitor, holds an antenna to locate rhinos at the Dinokeng Game Reserve near Hammanskraal, South Africa, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)
A rhino is seen at the Dinokeng Game Reserve near Hammanskraal, South Africa, Thursday, Sept. 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Alfonso Nqunjana)
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration's criminal investigation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell appeared on Monday to be emboldening defenders of the U.S. central bank, who pushed back against President Donald Trump’s efforts to exert more control over the Fed.
The backlash reflected the overarching stakes in determining the balance of power within the federal government and the path of the U.S. economy at a time of uncertainty about inflation and a slowing job market. This has created a sense among some Republican lawmakers and leading economists that the Trump administration had overstepped the Fed's independence by sending subpoenas.
The criminal investigation — a first for a sitting Fed chair — sparked an unusually robust response from Powell and a full-throated defense from three former Fed chairs, a group of top economic officials and even Republican senators tasked with voting on Trump's eventual pick to replace Powell as Fed chair when his term expires in May.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Trump did not direct his Justice Department to investigate Powell, who has proven to be a foil for Trump by insisting on setting the Fed's benchmark interest rates based on the data instead of the president's wishes.
“One thing for sure, the president’s made it quite clear, is Jerome Powell is bad at his job,” Leavitt said. “As for whether or not Jerome Powell is a criminal, that’s an answer the Department of Justice is going to have to find out.”
The investigation demonstrates the lengths the Trump administration is willing to go to try to assert control over the Fed, an independent agency that the president believes should follow his claims that inflationary pressures have faded enough for drastic rate cuts to occur. Trump has repeatedly used investigations — which might or might not lead to an actual indictment — to attack his political rivals.
The risks go far beyond Washington infighting to whether people can find work or afford their groceries. If the Fed errs in setting rates, inflation could surge or job losses could mount. Trump maintains that an economic boom is occurring and rates should be cut to pump more money into the economy, while Powell has taken a more cautious approach in the wake of Trump's tariffs.
Several Republican senators have condemned the Department of Justice's subpoenas of the Fed, which Powell revealed Sunday and characterized as “pretexts” to pressure him to sharply cut interest rates. Powell also said the Justice Department has threatened criminal indictments over his June testimony to Congress about the cost and design elements of a $2.5 billion building renovation that includes the Fed's headquarters.
“After speaking with Chair Powell this morning, it’s clear the administration’s investigation is nothing more than an attempt at coercion,” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, on Monday.
Jeanine Pirro, U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said on social media that the Fed “ignored” her office’s outreach to discuss the renovation cost overruns, “necessitating the use of legal process — which is not a threat.”
“The word ‘indictment’ has come out of Mr. Powell’s mouth, no one else’s,” Pirro posted on X, although the subpoenas and the White House’s own statement about determining Powell's criminality would suggest the risk of an indictment.
A bipartisan group of former Fed chairs and top economists on Monday called the Trump administration's investigation “an unprecedented attempt to use prosecutorial attacks" to undermine the Fed's independence, stressing that central banks controlled by political leaders tend to produce higher inflation and lower growth.
“I think this is ham-handed, counter-productive, and going to set back the president’s cause,” said Jason Furman, an economist at Harvard and former top adviser to President Barack Obama. The investigation could also unify the Fed’s interest-rate setting committee in support of Powell, and means “the next Fed chair will be under more pressure to prove their independence.”
The subpoenas apply to Powell's statements before a congressional committee about the renovation of Fed buildings, including its marble-clad headquarters in Washington, D.C. They come at an unusual moment when Trump was teasing the likelihood of announcing his nominee this month to succeed Powell as the Fed chair and could possibly be self-defeating for the nomination process.
While Powell's term as chair ends in four months, he has a separate term as a Fed governor until January 2028, meaning that he could remain on the board. If Powell stays on the board, Trump could be blocked from appointing an outside candidate of his choice to be the chair.
Powell quickly found a growing number of defenders among Republicans in the Senate, who will have the choice of whether to confirm Trump's planned pick for Fed chair.
Sen. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican and member of the Senate Banking panel, said late Sunday that he would oppose any of the Trump administration’s Fed nominees until the investigation is "resolved."
“If there were any remaining doubt whether advisers within the Trump Administration are actively pushing to end the independence of the Federal Reserve, there should now be none,” Tillis said.
Sen. Dave McCormick, R-Penn, said the Fed may have wasted public dollars with its renovation, but he said, “I do not think Chairman Powell is guilty of criminal activity.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune offered a brief but stern response Monday about the tariffs as he arrived at the U.S. Capitol, suggesting that the administration needed “serious” evidence of wrongdoing to take such a significant step.
“I haven’t seen the case or whatever the allegations or charges are, but I would say they better, they better be real and they better be serious,” said Thune, a Republican representing South Dakota.
If Powell stays on the board after his term as chair ends, the Trump administration would be deprived of the chance to fill another seat that would give the administration a majority on the seven-member board. That majority could then enact significant reforms at the Fed and even block the appointment of presidents at the Fed's 12 regional banks.
“They could do a lot of reorganizing and reforms” without having to pass new legislation, said Mark Spindel, chief investment officer at Potomac River Capital and author of a book on Fed independence. “That seat is very valuable.”
Powell has declined at several press conferences to answer questions about his plans to stay or leave the board.
Scott Alvarez, former general counsel at the Fed, says the investigation is intended to intimidate Powell from staying on the board. The probe is occurring now “to say to Chair Powell, ’We’ll use every mechanism that the administration has to make your life miserable unless you leave the Board in May,'" Alvarez said.
Asked on Monday by reporters if Powell planned to remain a Fed governor, Kevin Hassett, director of the White House National Economic Council and a leading candidate to become Fed chair, said he was unaware of Powell’s plans.
“I’ve not talked to Jay about that,” Hassett said.
A bipartisan group of former Fed chairs and top economists said in their Monday letter that the administration’s legal actions and the possible loss of Fed independence could hurt the broader economy.
“This is how monetary policy is made in emerging markets with weak institutions, with highly negative consequences for inflation and the functioning of their economies more broadly,” the statement said.
The statement was signed by former Fed chairs Ben Bernanke, Janet Yellen, and Alan Greenspan, as well as former Treasury Secretaries Henry Paulson and Robert Rubin.
Still, Trump's pressure campaign had been building for some time, with him relentlessly criticizing and belittling Powell.
He even appeared to preview the shocking news of the subpoenas at a Dec. 29 news conference by saying he would bring a lawsuit against Powell over the renovation costs.
“He’s just a very incompetent man,” Trump said. “But we’re going to probably bring a lawsuit against him.”
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AP writers Lisa Mascaro and Joey Cappelletti contributed to this report.
FILE - Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, right, and President Donald Trump look over a document of cost figures during a visit to the Federal Reserve, July 24, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)
