An Italian father and son have been shot dead by a ranger in a wildlife park in Zimbabwe, the parks and wildlife agency said on Monday.
The agency reported that the pair had been mistaken for elephant poachers.
The Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (ZPWMA) said Claudio Chiarelli and his son Max Chiarelli were members of volunteer anti-poaching organisation Zambezi Society, which was conducting patrols in Mana Pools National Park on Sunday.
The two men had been with a group sent out to relieve a team of rangers deployed the previous day to follow a trail of suspected poachers.
In a statement by the park’s agency, “The rangers saw movement in the thicket, heard voices and opened fire, accidentally shooting and killing on the spot the pair.”
“Unbeknown to them these were fresh deployments who had come to replace the rangers and had stopped to attend to a mechanical problem on their vehicle.” It said investigations were under way.
An official from the Italian embassy in Harare confirmed the deaths and said the older Chiarelli, who is a professional hunter, had been taking eight park rangers in his vehicle to relieve the group from which the shots were fired.
