Apes in the News

The Center for Orangutan Protection called on the government on Monday to repatriate 12 primates smuggled into Thailand a few years ago, citing concerns about their living conditions.

Hardi Baktiantoro, principal of the COP, said he was concerned about reports that the orangutans, smuggled out of Kalimantan between 2008 and 2009, were set to be moved to a zoo that he claimed had a questionable animal welfare record.

http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/home/bring-back-smuggled-orangutans-activist/428985

15/03/2011
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By Stephen Smith

Stephen Smith hopped aboard a military aircraft and joined a mission to save lives, a chimp, and to discover the city of Bangui

"HOW would you like to fly to the Central African Republic in a Hercules aircraft, rescue chimpanzees, distribute mozzie nets with Kingsley Holgate and rub shoulders with Jonty Rhodes?"

That was the question put to me by Lesley Sutton, Land Rover's media manager, two weeks earlier, and was why I was spending this particular dawn shaking and rattling down the runway at Waterkloof Air Force Base, en route to Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, via Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

http://www.timeslive.co.za/lifestyle/travel/article956413.ece/Bangui-Days

13/03/2011
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An expert from Jersey's Durrell Wildlife Trust will be visiting a project in Sumatra where twins have been born to two blind orangutans.

Durrell supports the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme financially and through an exchange system.

It is unusual amongst orangutans and other great apes to have twins, and in this case both parents are blind.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-jersey-12716674

11/03/2011
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Gorilla meat being sold for $6 a hand-sized piece

March 2011: Gorilla poaching in the Republic of Congo continues unabated according to the latest research. The most recent known death was a female gorilla killed near Ndinga Village in November, while gorilla meat is still for sale in food markets of Pointe Noire, the republic's second largest city.

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/gorilla-poaching032011.html#cr

10/03/2011
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Forty years after Birute Mary Galdikas became the world's leading protector of orangutans, the Canadian scientist's quest to secure a more sustainable future for our long-armed primate cousins is about to mark two major milestones.

Next month will see the worldwide release of the Warner Bros. IMAX documentary Born to Be Wild, directed by Canadian filmmaker David Lickley and showcasing the 64-year-old Galdikas' inspiring conservation efforts at her orangutan sanctuary in Borneo.

 Meanwhile, the Indonesian government appears ready to approve the creation a unique jungle reserve where up to 150 of the animals that the Vancouver primatologist has nurtured to maturity over the past four decades could finally be released into the wild.

http://www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/movie-guide/Canadian+angel+celebrate+creation+orangutan+sanctuary/4419381/story.html

10/03/2011
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TANJUNG PUTING NATIONAL PARK, Indonesia - Their black eyes peer from the slats of wooden cages, hundreds of orangutans orphaned after their mothers were shot or hacked to death for straying out of Indonesia's rapidly disappearing forests in search of food.

No one wants to get them back into the wild as much as Birute Mary Galdikas, who has devoted a lifetime to studying the great red apes, now on the verge of extinction. And for the first time in years, there is a glimmer of hope on the horizon, thanks to a Hong Kong-based development company's plans to protect a 91,000-hectare (224,866-acre) peatland forest along Tanjung Puting National Park's eastern edge.

"The problem has been finding a safe place to release them," said the 64-year-old scientist. "Many are ready to go right now."

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/unleashed/2011/03/orangutans-indonesia-may-be-freed.html

08/03/2011
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