One of the most extreme NGOs, the Earth Island Institute, with the assistance and perhaps complicity with US State Department officials abroad, spear-headed the "Inter-American Convention for the Protection and Conservation of Sea Turtles". It was of course fully supported by the Marine Turtle Specialist Group (MTSG) of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The promoters of this new convention never told potential signatories that by becoming a member, CITES Parties would lose fundamental Sovereign Rights they retain under CITES. The objective of the new convention is unequivocally clear - it is to take away from nations the access rights to their marine turtle resources they have under CITES. The new convention creates "opposing" obligations. Cleaver ... perhaps .... but deadly for Sovereign Rights, human rights and in the long term, for marine turtles.

The MTSG, operating under the prestigious banner of the IUCN embarked on a worldwide crusade to denounce any attempt to use the sea turtles wisely. From a focus on science, they became advocates for the turtle protection, spreading outdated, un-scientific and biased information. Using the power and credentials of their parent organisation, the IUCN, they mislead Governments, Parties to CITES and the public.