Police deployed in Mexico to protect monarch butterfly reserve

Mexico has deployed police officers to patrol the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve in the center of the country to prevent illegal logging, the government announced Tuesday.

Alejandro del Mazo, the country's attorney general for natural protection, told a press conference that 60 police officers would patrol the habitat, where millions of butterflies fly down from the U.S. and Canada every year.

The police were deployed across the woods of the massive reserve, which stretches across the State of Mexico and Michoacan, marking the first time police have been deployed on environmental protection duty in a national park.

The butterflies arrive from September and November each year but have been facing pressure from illegal logging which has reduced the forest cover they nest in.

"One of our objectives is to reduce logging to zero, achieving a total protection of the biosphere reserve and the habitat," said del Mazo.

Omar Vidal, director of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in Mexico, also praised the actions already taken by environmental authorities and inhabitants of the reserve, which he said had reduced illegal logging by 40 percent in 2015-2016. Enditem