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Giant Ant Harvester Bust in Kenya - Smugglers Plead Guilty

Four men - two Belgians, a Vietnamese, and a Kenyan - have pleaded guilty in Kenya to attempting to smuggle hundreds of protected giant African harvester ants out of the country in what the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) called a "landmark case".

The insects, valued at up to U.S.$220 each, were concealed in specially modified test tubes and syringes designed to keep them alive for up to two months. Photographs of the illegal haul shared by the KWS showed hundreds of these containers packed with cotton wool, each with two or three ants.

The KWS described the case as Kenya's first large-scale instance of insect biopiracy and noted a troubling shift in trafficking trends from iconic mammals to ecologically vital but lesser-known species.

Pixabay

Messor cephalotes, also known as the Giant African Harvester Ant, is a large, aggressive harvester ant species native to eastern Africa, particularly in countries like Kenya, Tanzania, and Ethiopia.

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