Kalimantan / Borneo / Indonesia –On Sunday January 22nd FOUR PAWS rescued two orangutans (mother and daughter) from almost certain death at the hands of local people who have been paid by palm oil companies to hunt down and slaughter the animals.

 

Photographs taken at the scene show the terrified mother cuddling and comforting her young daughter. The mother was found to be pregnant.

 

The FOUR PAWS team moved the orangutan the mother and her daughter in to a remote and safe area of the rainforest and released them there into the wild. The mother has been equipped with radio senders to enable monitoring of them both and to be sure that they are adapting well to the new environment.

 

Before finding the mother and daughter FOUR PAWS had scoured the area for orangutans in imminent danger from attack. Sadly no other orangutans had survived the earlier slaughter.

 

Orangutans, very close relatives of humans, are threatened by losing their entire habitat due to rainforest deforestation.. From 250.000 orangutans a few decades ago less than 50.000 have survived till now.. But deforestation is not the only threat: Some palm oil companies are determined to rid the newly created farmland of orangutans who they see as a pest.

 

The orangutan massacres have recently come to the attention of the media in Indonesia.  For the first time authorities have decided to arrest people including a senior manager at one oil palm company called Khaleda. It is alleged that Khaleda had offered a reward of 1million Indonesian Rupiah (£70) for each orangutan killed.

 

Over the course of the last couple of years hundreds of rewards have been claimed. The allegations are that certain palm oil companies paid up to £70 to their employees  for the killing of orang-utans found in their plantations. At first these stories were denied. However last September graves and bones were found by investigators and the scandal has now hit the Indonesian media with the welfare of wild orangutans quickly becoming a major political issue.

 

Killing orangutans is illegal in Indonesia, but the law is lacking enforcement. Before November 2011 only two low level arrests had ever been made. In the last two months 10 more arrests have taken place including the arrest of the senior manager of the plantation where the worst graves have been found.

 

With so many adult orangutans being slaughtered the hunters keep the babies alive and sell them to the pet trade. FOUR PAWS and its partner BOS do everything they can to rescue the traumatised little babies who are being illegally kept as pets. The orphans are then taken to the Samboja orangutan sanctuary where they are taught skills they will need in order to return to the wild and fend for themselves.

 

“Our investigation could not have been more timely. It is extremely fortunate we arrived when we did –a few minutes later and the orangutans could have been dead”, said Dr. Signe Preuschoft, FOUR PAWS’primate expert. “We discovered a gang of young men surrounding the two orangutans. Both victims were clearly petrified and the gang were jubilant in anticipation of their rewards for catching and killing the animals. We hope that the public attention to our rescue action will help many more orang-utans than the two we are about to release.

 

“For the first time in Indonesian history,  the fate of the orangutan has become a genuine political issue. The massacres must not be allowed to continue. Orangutan habitat in the lowland rainforests needs adequate protection. Those breaking the law should be paying for their crimes not charities and most of all not the orangutans themselves.”

 

For further information please contact:

Fiona Miles

Operational Director

Email:  fiona.miles@vier-pfoten.org

Cell: 083 408 0463

Office:  058 303 1651

 

Images of the rescue operation can be obtained here:

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