Sri Lanka scraps proposal to export monkeys to China

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka has scrapped plans to export 100,000 endangered toque macaque monkeys to China, the Wildlife and Nature Protection Society of Sri Lanka, one of the 30 petitioners who went to court against the proposal, said on Monday.

The island nation, facing its worst economic crisis in more than seven decades, was considering a proposal by a Chinese private company to capture and export wild toque macaques to zoos in China.

Conservation organisations had warned that the monkeys could be headed to labs instead of zoos, and had approached the country's Court of Appeal seeking any decision to export them to China be quashed.

When the matter was taken up on Monday, the attorney general said the Department of Wildlife and Conservation had assured it that "they will not be taking steps to export monkeys to China", WNPS said in a statement.

"The case will be taken up before the Court of Appeal on 6th July to record the above undertaking given to the Court by the State," the WNPS said.

Toque macaques, currently found only in Sri Lanka, are among species identified as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Animal rights non-profit People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) said the government's decision recognised the animals "aren't commodities to be bought and sold".

"These macaques are individuals with families who live in tight-knit communities. Their lives matter, and so does their contribution to their forest home," PETA primate scientist Dr. Lisa Jones-Engel said.

The value of the proposed deal between the company and the Sri Lankan government had not been disclosed.