WIDER IMAGE — In Sri Lanka, human — elephant conflict takes deadly toll

For the photo essay click here By Uditha Jayasinghe and Thilina Kaluthotage GALGAMUWA, Sri Lanka, Oct 15 (Reuters) — Clad in his khaki wildlife officer’s uniform, Dewagiri Mudiyanselage Thilakaratne Bandara rides his motorbike the short distance from his home to the electric fence that is the main line of defence against the dozens of wild elephants that live in the rapidly shrinking forest nearby. The fence stretches 14 km (9 miles) along the Siyambalangamuwa tank, a reservoir in the island's northwest, to protect the more than 2,000 families who live in the nearby villages. Galgamuwa is on the front line of one of the world's most serious human-elephant conflicts. An average of 138 people have been killed in encounters with the animals each year in Sri Lanka since 2019, the second-highest death toll in the world. The death toll for elephants, forced into villages for food as their habitat shrinks, climbed to an average of 402 a year during the same period, the world's highest. “Twenty years ago, we didn’t have this situation because across from the tank there were large forests, but they were eventually cleared and then the elephants started moving closer and that’s how this vill