This has been coming for a long time - this is not news. Many people have known the dolphin was under dire threat for decades, and nobody did a single thing about it. Since the construction of the Three Gorges dam the ecosystem of the Yangtze has suffered. Add into that the unregulated pollution of the river and overfishing from an increasing population and this was on the cards.

The most sickening thing about this whole affair is the weeping and gnashing of teeth going on whilst the core issues are (as usual) ignored. China is turning into a totalitarian capitalist monstrosity and the world plays along gladly. It pollutes without fear of or regard for the consquences on the local population or wildlife. It continues to industrialise without regulation, often forcibly removing the popluation of entire villages that have been their for hundreds or possibly thousands of years, so it can build new industrial sites. These people loose their land and therefoppre their livelihoods - but who gives a tinker's cuss if it means we get cheap trainers?

It's polluting Tibet - which it occupies illegally (can't see the Americans or British giving a toss about that one though - they stopped giving a shite about the freedom of the Tibetans when they discovered it made no financial sense to upset China), and in Africa it regularly wins construction contracts because it undercuts Western companies by virtue of the fact it disregards both the environment and local workers rights (no change there then - it's just the Chinese instead of the West shafting the Africans this time).

We're all guilty of letting this happen. The Chinese Dragon is going to bite a lot harder yet.

Across the world also look out for the imminent demise of:

Boto (Amazon River Dolphin)
Amazon Giant Otter
Tigers: All species under severe threat across their range
Whales: Several species will be hunted if the Japanese and Norweigans get their way
etc etc etc