The United Nations on Tuesday granted China permission to import elephant ivory from Africa under strict conditions, the world body's spokesman for CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) said.

In a deal reached last year in The Hague, the administrative capital of the Netherlands, four African countries - Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe - were given the right to make one-off sales of registered ivory stocks.

CITES spokesman Juan Carlos Vasquez said: "China was accepted as a trading partner to import ivory from the four authorized countries in southern Africa."