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Kenya Arrests Man Trying to Smuggle Over 2,000 Live Ants in his Luggage

People arriving at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), in Nairobi, Kenya, on 06 March 2026. EPA/DANIEL IRUNGU
People arriving at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), in Nairobi, Kenya, on 06 March 2026. EPA/DANIEL IRUNGU
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Kenya Arrests Man Trying to Smuggle Over 2,000 Live Ants in his Luggage

People arriving at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), in Nairobi, Kenya, on 06 March 2026. EPA/DANIEL IRUNGU
People arriving at the Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), in Nairobi, Kenya, on 06 March 2026. EPA/DANIEL IRUNGU

A man was arrested with more than 2,200 live garden ants in his luggage at Nairobi's main airport this week amid a rise in cases of smuggling of the insects in Kenya.

Chinese national Zhang Kequn, 27, was arrested at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport on Tuesday while he was trying to leave the country, court filings seen by Reuters on Thursday showed. Immigration officials flagged a "stop order" on Zhang's passport after he ⁠evaded arrest in ⁠Kenya last year.

Ant aficionados pay large sums to maintain colonies in large transparent vessels known as formicariums, which offer a literal window into the species' complex social structures and behaviors.

Last year four men were fined $7,700 each ⁠for trying to traffic thousands of ants valuable to Kenya's ecosystem in a case that experts said signaled a shift in biopiracy from trophies like elephant ivory to lesser-known species.

Investigators said a search of Zhang's luggage recovered 2,238 ants, including 1,948 packed in test tubes and the rest in three rolls of "soft tissue papers".

They said Zhang had been in Kenya for ⁠two ⁠weeks and had mentioned three accomplices who supplied him with the ants.

The Kenya Wildlife Service told the court that it needed more time to complete investigations, including examining an iPhone and a MacBook recovered from Zhang.

The wildlife service said a similar consignment of ants had been seized in Bangkok on Tuesday that originated from Kenya, indicating the existence of a widespread and organized ant-smuggling network.

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Varieties

Nepali Climber Alive after Six Days Missing on Everest

This photograph taken on May 20, 2026, shows mountaineers on Everest. Furte Sherpa / AFP
This photograph taken on May 20, 2026, shows mountaineers on Everest. Furte Sherpa / AFP
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Nepali Climber Alive after Six Days Missing on Everest

This photograph taken on May 20, 2026, shows mountaineers on Everest. Furte Sherpa / AFP
This photograph taken on May 20, 2026, shows mountaineers on Everest. Furte Sherpa / AFP

A Nepali climbing guide who went missing on Mount Everest for six days and was feared dead has been found alive after crawling back to Base Camp, officials told AFP on Thursday.

The experienced Hillary Dawa Sherpa vanished on the upper reaches of the world's highest mountain early on May 30.

He was found on Thursday morning close to Base Camp by the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee (SPCC), a Nepali team that helps set routes on Everest and clean up waste left behind.

"He was crawling down," Pemba Sherpa of 8K Expeditions, which was overseeing search and rescue efforts, told AFP.

"A helicopter has been sent to bring him to a hospital in Kathmandu."

Climber Chris Thrall, a former British Royal Marine, said he successfully summited the 8,849-meter (29,032-foot) peak with Sherpa around 5:00 pm on May 29.

He posted a video message on Instagram on Wednesday morning what he thought was the death of Sherpa.

He called Sherpa an "absolute gentle giant of a man and a true 'tiger of the mountains'", in a post that assumed the worst.

Thrall described how on May 30 he had begun to descend from Camp Four -- at around 7,950m -- and just below the low-oxygen "death zone".

He said that as he descended, Sherpa stopped.

"He sat down for a rest with his backpack, these guys carry huge loads," he said.

"And I turned and I said, 'Hillary, are you okay, brother?' He said, 'Yes, yes, fine Chris, please go, go!' This is nothing new, you know, I'd go ahead, he'd go ahead."

As Thrall went down he found a Polish climber who was struggling after running out of supplementary oxygen and had suffered frostbite.

"It had been a long summit push. What should have been five days to the summit and back took us 11 days, that's how challenging the conditions were," said Thrall.

"So, do I go back for Sherpa, who's probably going to rock up and be fine, as he has done hundreds of times before?" he added.

"Or do I help my fellow climber, who's got no oxygen, frostbite in his fingers, and obviously you're never far off hypothermia up there?"

Thrall described tough conditions, sharing his oxygen cylinder with the Pole as they descended, taking 11 hours to get to Camp Three. It would usually take two hours.

He said: "I realized we had a really serious situation."

Search teams set out to find Sherpa but he was not seen again until Thursday morning, having made his way down on his own.

The climb was one of the last of the season, meaning that there were few other mountaineers on the peak.

At least five people have died this season -- two Indians and three Nepali climbers involved in Everest preparations.

More than one thousand climbers reached the summit of Everest this season, according to initial tallies by Nepali officials, making it the busiest season on record.

Varieties

Canadian Government Endorses Plan to Move Whales from Shuttered Park to US, Spain

FILE - Beluga whales swim in a tank at Marineland amusement park in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada, June 9, 2023. (Chris Young/The Canadian Press via AP, File)
FILE - Beluga whales swim in a tank at Marineland amusement park in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada, June 9, 2023. (Chris Young/The Canadian Press via AP, File)
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Canadian Government Endorses Plan to Move Whales from Shuttered Park to US, Spain

FILE - Beluga whales swim in a tank at Marineland amusement park in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada, June 9, 2023. (Chris Young/The Canadian Press via AP, File)
FILE - Beluga whales swim in a tank at Marineland amusement park in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada, June 9, 2023. (Chris Young/The Canadian Press via AP, File)

Canada's government endorsed a plan Wednesday to move the last remaining captive whales from a shuttered theme park in Ontario to aquariums in the United States and Spain — a plan that could save them from mass euthanasia if the deal goes through.

There are 30 belugas and four dolphins left in the Marineland park and zoo in Niagara Falls, Ontario, which announced in early 2023 that it was for sale and closed to the public in late summer 2024. No sale has yet been announced, The Associated Press reported.

The former tourist attraction has since worked to move the park’s remaining animals and sell the sprawling property near Horseshoe Falls.

In 2024, Marineland was found guilty under Ontario’s animal cruelty laws in a case related to its care of three black bears.

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has issued the first batch of permits to move the whales and is set to issue different permits closer to the move, expected to take place in the next few months. It recently issued permits for the whales and dolphins under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, otherwise known as CITES permits.

“I think this is a positive step forward,” Fisheries Minister Joanne Thompson said. “There’s still more work to be done, but it’s a step forward.”

Twenty whales — 19 belugas and one killer whale — have died at Marineland since 2019, according to provincial government data obtained through freedom-of-information laws and official statements.

Thompson's office said the ministry is coordinating with the Canada Border Services Agency, Health Canada and other ministries to “ensure all requirements are met for a safe and timely transfer.”

Marineland said it is “fully committed to the safe and timely relocation of our beluga whales, and we want to be clear: this is our top priority.”

“Relocating these animals is an extraordinarily complex undertaking,” the park said in a statement.

The Canadian government has not decided whether it will provide taxpayer dollars to help move the whales.

The belugas and dolphins are set to head to five marine parks: Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta, SeaWorld locations in San Antonio and San Diego, and Oceanografic Valencia.

Mystic Aquarium in Connecticut, where Marineland sent five belugas to in 2021, will also help with the move, the American consortium said.

Marineland's founder, John Holer, died in 2018. His wife, Marie Holer, took over operations of the park and put it up for sale in 2023, before she died in 2024.

The estate has been working since to dismantle the park, which features roller-coasters and other rides.

Varieties

Scientists Find New Species of Dragonfly, Grasshopper and a Fluorescent Spider

A crowned crab spider that fluoresces under UV light, discovered during a scientific expedition to Angola's remote Lisima plateau, is pictured in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 3, 2026. (The Wilderness Project/Handout via Reuters)
A crowned crab spider that fluoresces under UV light, discovered during a scientific expedition to Angola's remote Lisima plateau, is pictured in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 3, 2026. (The Wilderness Project/Handout via Reuters)
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Scientists Find New Species of Dragonfly, Grasshopper and a Fluorescent Spider

A crowned crab spider that fluoresces under UV light, discovered during a scientific expedition to Angola's remote Lisima plateau, is pictured in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 3, 2026. (The Wilderness Project/Handout via Reuters)
A crowned crab spider that fluoresces under UV light, discovered during a scientific expedition to Angola's remote Lisima plateau, is pictured in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 3, 2026. (The Wilderness Project/Handout via Reuters)

Wildlife ‌experts found eight new species of dragonfly, three unknown grasshoppers and some 60 new butterflies and moths in vivid hues during a trip to Angola's Lisima plateau in February, a conservation group said on Wednesday.

The Wilderness Project visited the waters that flow through the plateau and which feed four of Africa's major rivers: the Congo, Okavango, Zambezi and Cuanza.

New species included an ‌armored, predatory ‌cricket, a previously undescribed species of ‌copper ⁠caterpillar and its adult ⁠butterfly, and a crowned crab spider that fluoresces under ultraviolet light.

Experts also found a new blood orange-hued species of ladybird orb-web spider which mimics ladybirds in signaling to predators with a bright color - normally a darker red - ⁠that it is too bitter or toxic.

"The ‌armored crickets are ‌very cool ... very fierce-looking," expedition leader Rob Taylor told ‌Reuters. "As a defense mechanism, they can actually squirt ‌fluid onto whoever's trying to attack them."

A new species of an adult butterfly, discovered during a scientific expedition to Angola's remote Lisima plateau, is pictured in this handout image obtained by Reuters on June 3, 2026. (The Wilderness Project/Handout via Reuters)

Scientists the world over are frantically trying to record species as they reckon with a global ecological crisis that ‌has put a million plant and animal species on the brink of extinction. ⁠

They ⁠estimate there are 8.7 million species in the world, of which science has identified only 1.5 million.

Many are fast disappearing because of human activity, with more than 800 animal species going extinct since around 1500.

Taylor said wildlife in the Lisima plateau was threatened by "tree-felling, deforestation and ... the artisanal diamond mining industry," as well as by slash-and-burn agriculture, which razes natural forests to use the soil for planting, only to see the nutrients wash away.