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	The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) presented Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra with a petition signed by 500,000 people from 200 countries urging her to announce a ban at next month&#39;s meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.</div>
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	&quot;We will consider the issue and how we can help,&quot; said Yingluck, who was scheduled to open the meeting Sunday.</div>
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	Thailand&#39;s ivory trade has been blamed for fuelling the smuggling of elephant tusks from Africa, which, the WWF said, claims about 30,000 pachyderms a year.</div>
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	The WWF has urged members of the convention to impose sanctions on Thailand if its government does not take measures to stop the illegal trade in African ivory.</div>
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	Although Thailand is signatory to the convention and abides by the treaty&#39;s ban on trade in African ivory, Thai law allows the sale of ivory taken from domesticated Asian elephants registered in Thailand.</div>
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	Conservationists charged that Thailand&#39;s legal trade in elephant tusks provides an opening for African ivory illegally smuggled into the kingdom.//DPA</div>
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Conservation group calls on Thailand to ban ivory trade

Thailand should use an international meeting in Bangkok aimed at saving threatened species to ban its ivory trade, a conservation group said Wednesday.