Kusasi was an extraordinary orangutan. Unlike most orangutans living in the wild, he was the star of his own film called “Kusasi: From Orphan to King,” which initially aired on BBC and PBS in 2005, subsequently shown worldwide. Kusasi also became famous as the dominant Camp Leakey adult male orangutan. Kusasi first came to Camp […]

Nine young wild born captive orangutans whom Taiwanese officials had confiscated and one young orangutan whom Orangutan Foundation Taiwan (OFT) acquired for repatriation became known as the “Taiwan Ten” in the early 1990s. OFT and OFI worked to coordinate the return of the Taiwan Ten to Borneo. In mid-September 1990, Dr. Biruté obtained the import […]

Hundreds of orangutans were smuggled to fuel the exotic pet trade from the rainforests of Borneo and Sumatra to areas far beyond orangutan native range in the 1980s and 1990s. In 1990, the Royal Thai Forestry seized six infant orangutans at the Bangkok Airport who were in the process of being smuggled to the former […]