An American trophy hunter has paid $100,000 (£78,000) to kill a rare markhor or “screw horn” goat, the national animal of Pakistan.

Fewer than 6,000 markhors exist in the wild, most living among the mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the animal features on the IUCN’s Red List of Threatened Species.

Nonetheless, local officials in Gilgit-Baltistan have issued permits for hunters to kill four Astore markhors – a subspecies with trademark flared horns – during the current season.

The American hunter was named in Pakistani media as John Amistoso, and local newspapers ran photographs of Mr Amistoso posing with a dead markhor.

The hunt…