Mountain Patrol

Kekexili, the largest animal reserve in China, is home to many rare species, including the Tibetan antelope. Prized for its skin that is used in making luxurious, albeit illegal, shatoosh scarves, the antelope’s numbers have been dwindling drastically in the past twenty years as poachers slaughter the animals, often hundreds at a time. In the 1990’s local Tibetans formed a volunteer patrol to try to stop the illegal poaching – sometimes at the cost of their own lives. “Kekexili” chronicles the life-and-death struggle between these volunteers and the poachers, and takes place in the 5,000-meter high Kekexili on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau.