Prominent Malaysian animal rights activists say that conditions at Kemaman Zoo in Terengganu are appalling. Members of the NGOs Malaysian Friends of the Animals and Friends of the Orangutans (Foto) have recently provided photographic evidence indicating that several resident animals, from orangutans to elephants, were being neglected and mistreated at…

Imagine being locked into a grimy little enclosure just so that people can stare at you. You’re nothing but an exhibit for the amusement of others, yet your keepers care little about your wellbeing. And this goes on for years. Horrific? It sure is. Yet this is the fate that…

Here comes bad news for friends of Lasah, the ageing work elephant: Despite public outrage at his alleged  ill treatment and a long campaign to secure his release, Lasah will remain at the Langkawi Elephant Adventures (LEA) amusement park on Langkawi island in Kedah. Malaysian wildlife authorities have decided they saw no reason…

Lasah is fine, thank you very much. He isn’t lonely or sad or neglected or abused. Now if you could please stop bugging us about him, that would be much appreciated. This is essentially the gist of an answer that the management of the Langkawi Elephant Adventures Park (LEA) has given in…

You would think that it would be a simple matter: following a public outrage over his ill-treatment, wildlife authorities would step in and rescue Lasah, an ageing work elephant, from facing further daily abuse at a tourist site. But no, you would be wrong. Last July the conservationist group Friends of the Orangutans (FOTO) first…

All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others. This truism is sadly true not only in the dystopian world of George Orwell’s classic novel “Animal Farm,” but also in the world of animal welfare in Malaysia. As we have point out on Clean Malaysia, even as…

Back in July, as we reported on Clean Malaysia, the plight of Lasah caused widespread outrage. The 36-year-old elephant bull, an investigation by the animal rights group Friends of the Orangutans (FOTO) revealed, was kept in chains and bondage at the Langkawi Elephant Adventures amusement park. He was used for…

If you want to ride on captive elephants at elephant camps, or take pictures with captive tigers at tiger farms, or monkey around with captive orangutans at “wildlife parks” (though we most certainly hope you don’t want to do any such thing), then you can from now on forget about…

Tree by precious tree forests around Malaysia are getting stripped of their greenery. The reason: woods are harvested for timber or they are cut down so that their places can be taken by oil palms. And not even protected forest reserves are being spared. Upreshpal Singh, a noted environmentalist who…

Lasah, a 36-year-old Asian elephant, has never had it easy. Caught in the wild as a young animal, he would find himself forced to work in logging, where he endured backbreaking hardships. He would also find himself confined to small enclosures in a zoo, where visitors came to gawk at…

Yoda, a male orangutan, recently sneaked out of the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre (SORC) in Sabah, where he was a resident, and began to make his way to a nearby hotel where he was known to like cadging treats from staffers and tourists alike. He never made it. The orangutan…