Environmental and animal-rights groups are lining up to oppose a lawsuit that seeks to let American sport hunters again import hides of polar bears shot legally in Canada.

Safari Club International wants to overturn a ban put in place last month when the U. S. interior secretary declared polar bears a threatened species.

Politicians from Canada's Northwest Territories this week made the same request to Interior Department officials in Washington, D. C.

Bob McLeod, the Northwest Territories' minister for energy, industry and tourism, said Monday the import ban would effectively wipe out its sports hunting industry.

But opponents say sport hunting adds stress to polar bears already menaced by a loss of sea ice, their main habitat.

The U. S. Department of Interior on May 15 declared polar bears threatened, or likely to become endangered within the foreseeable future, because of habitat loss.

Trophy hunting of U. S. bears in Alaska has been banned since 1972.

Bears killed by subsistence hunters are not considered a threat.

Dirk Kempthorne, the U. S. interior secretary, declared polar bears threatened throughout their range and the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service withdrew authorization to import hides from animals killed in approved populations in Canada -- including animals already killed and awaiting a taxidermist mount.

Importation was allowed through an amendment to the Marine Mammal Protection Act passed by Congress in 1994.

Safari Club International on May 23 filed a required 60-day notice of its intent to sue to overturn the ban, not just for bears already killed but also on behalf of members who hope to hunt in the future, including those who booked and paid for hunts in 2009 and 2010.

Doug Burdin, a lawyer for Safari Club International, said Wednesday that his organization may join the state of Alaska in suing to overturn the listing, but so far has only filed to overturn the ban on importing hides.

A listing under the Endangered Species Act does not create an import ban, he said, and the Fish and Wildlife Service did not follow the law in banning hides.

"They never held any kind of rule-making for designating the polar bear as a depleted species under the Marine Mammal Protection Act," he said.

The ban certainly should not apply to bears killed before May 15, he said.

Safari Club International also argues that sport hunting by U. S. citizens aids bears by supporting Canada's sustainable use harvest programs.

A hunt can cost $40,000 to $50,000 and Safari Club International claims income from hunters helps support polar bear research and provides a direct economic benefit to Canada native communities from supporting and guiding hunts.

"This infusion of cash into the cash-strapped native communities provides another incentive for these people to accept the western-based science and management that facilitates polar bear conservation and that is required before the Service will approve a population for import," he wrote.

A half-dozen groups want more, not fewer, protections for polar bears and filed to intervene in the lawsuit, including the Center for Biological Diversity, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Greenpeace, which petitioned for the polar bear listing.

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