Although born late last year, Rio has drawn renewed attention in recent days after the park and authorities released new images and updates on his development, bringing the conservation success into the international spotlight. The cub is being closely monitored by veterinarians and remains under the care of his mother, Hu Chun, as he is still blind and deaf in his early development.

Officials say Rio’s birth highlights advances in panda conservation as well as strengthening diplomatic ties between Indonesia and China. With this success, Indonesia becomes the fourth country in Asia outside China to breed a giant panda in captivity, joining Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand .

“We found this little chimp tied to a tree...very malnourished, dehydrated,” Amarasekaran recalls of the encounter in Matotaka village. “They asked if we were interested. At that time, we didn’t even realise it was illegal or anything,” he told the AFP. Without intervention, the animal would likely have died. He brought it home. That chimp was the beginning of the Tacugama Chimpanzee Sanctuary.

But what started as a spontaneous act of compassion quickly turned into a life-changing discovery. “That’s when we started to realise this is not an ordinary monkey. They have jealousy, love, they get angry... just like us,” he said. The human-like emotional depth of chimps drew Amarasekaran deeper into conservation work. He eventually quit his job, intending to set up the sanctuary for “one or two years.” “That never happened,” he says. Decades later, he’s still there.

Today, Tacugama is home to over 100 rescued chimps and is one of Sierra Leone’s most relevant conservation efforts. Yet Amarasekaran admits the sanctuary is treating symptoms, not causes. “We are rescuing chimps, but why are they being poached? Why are their homes disappearing?” he asks.

Habitat loss, illegal pet trade , and bushmeat hunting continue to threaten wild chimpanzees across West Africa. Amarasekaran’s long-term goal is not to grow the sanctuary, it’s to make it obsolete. “Our mission is to stop them coming to Tacugama,” he says. “The moment they are left alone and are a free-roaming population in our forests, that’s the day I can say we’ve done something good for conservation.”

After 13 long years of trying to mate Susi, the 15-year-old mother orangutan, Kasang Kulim conservation centre saw the birth of Ade on May 2 after a 10-month-long pregnancy.

"Thank God, after about 13 years here, we tried to mate the orangutan mother, and it managed to get pregnant. The pregnancy was 10 months long until the baby was born on May 2," Agustina, the manager of the Kasang Kulim conservation centre, told AFP.

Over 75% of the world ’s orangutan population resides in the forests of Indonesian Borneo.

Orangutans are particularly vulnerable to hunters due to their large size and slow movements. They are often killed for meat or in retaliation when they encroach on farmland and damage crops — a behaviour that typically arises when food becomes scarce in their natural forest habitat.

They are especially vulnerable due to their very low reproductive rate. Females typically give birth to a single infant only once every 3 to 5 years, making population recovery from declines a slow process.

Their arrest sparked debates over Kenya’s fight against biopiracy and the exploitation of the country’s genetic resources.

The suspects were apprehended after authorities intercepted live queen ants hidden in specially modified test tubes and syringes at JKIA.

"Investigations revealed that the test tubes had been designed to sustain the ants for up to two months and evade airport security detection, including X-ray scanners. Cotton wool was used to maintain the ants' survival during transit, indicating a premeditated and well-executed trafficking operation," the Kenyan Wildlife Service noted in a statement.

According to investigators, the accused entered Kenya on tourist visas and planned to smuggle the ants to exotic pet markets in Europe and Asia, where there is growing demand for rare insect species. 

Messor cephalotes, in particular, is prized among collectors for its sophisticated colony-building behavior and pest control capabilities, making it a popular feature in formicariums - artificial ant habitats.

The illegal export of Kenya’s ant species violates both national legislation and international agreements, including the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit-Sharing, which mandates prior informed consent for the use of a country’s genetic resources.