Japan Post to Stop Delivery of Live Reptiles 

A monitor lizard looks out under a hut at the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve in Singapore on January 15, 2025. (AFP)
A monitor lizard looks out under a hut at the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve in Singapore on January 15, 2025. (AFP)
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Japan Post to Stop Delivery of Live Reptiles 

A monitor lizard looks out under a hut at the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve in Singapore on January 15, 2025. (AFP)
A monitor lizard looks out under a hut at the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve in Singapore on January 15, 2025. (AFP)

Japan Post will not deliver live reptiles starting from April on animal welfare grounds, a company spokeswoman said Wednesday.

Customers had raised concerns and animal rights activists had criticized the service online, the spokeswoman for the nationwide postal service told AFP.

"After consulting with the government... we came to realize that shipping animals in an environment where temperature control and food are unavailable can amount to animal abuse," she said.

From April 1, Japan Post -- which already does not allow mammals or birds to be sent by mail -- will not deliver reptiles through any parcel or other postal services, the spokeswoman added.



Court: Elephants Can't Pursue their Release from Colorado Zoo Because they're Not Human

FILE - This undated photo provided by the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo shows elephants Kimba, front, and Lucky, back, at the Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo. (Cheyenne Mountain Zoo via AP, File)
FILE - This undated photo provided by the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo shows elephants Kimba, front, and Lucky, back, at the Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo. (Cheyenne Mountain Zoo via AP, File)
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Court: Elephants Can't Pursue their Release from Colorado Zoo Because they're Not Human

FILE - This undated photo provided by the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo shows elephants Kimba, front, and Lucky, back, at the Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo. (Cheyenne Mountain Zoo via AP, File)
FILE - This undated photo provided by the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo shows elephants Kimba, front, and Lucky, back, at the Zoo in Colorado Springs, Colo. (Cheyenne Mountain Zoo via AP, File)

Five elephants at a Colorado zoo may be “majestic” but, since they're not human, they do not have the legal right to pursue their release, Colorado’s highest court said Tuesday.
The ruling from the Colorado Supreme Court follows a similar court defeat in New York in 2022 for an elephant named Happy at the Bronx Zoo in a case brought by an animal rights group. Rulings in favor of the animals would have allowed lawyers for both Happy and the elephants at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs — Missy, Kimba, Lucky, LouLou and Jambo — to pursue a long-held legal process for prisoners to challenge their detention and possibly be sent to live in an elephant sanctuary instead, The Associated Press reported.
“It bears noting that the narrow legal question before this court does not turn on our regard for these majestic animals generally or these five elephants specifically. Instead, the legal question here boils down to whether an elephant is a person as that term is used in the habeas corpus statute. And because an elephant is not a person, the elephants here do not have standing to bring a habeas corpus claim,” the court said in its ruling.
The same animal rights group that tried to win Happy’s release, the Nonhuman Rights Project, also brought the case in Colorado.
The group argued that the Colorado elephants, born in the wild in Africa, have shown signs of brain damage because the zoo is essentially a prison for such intelligent and social creatures, known to roam for miles a day. It wanted the animals released to one of the two accredited elephant sanctuaries in the United States because the group doesn’t think they can no longer live in the wild.
The zoo argued moving the elephants and potentially placing them with new animals would be cruel at their age, possibly causing unnecessary stress. It said they aren’t used to being in larger herds and, based on the zoo's observations, the elephants don’t have the skills or desire to join one.
In a statement, the Nonhuman Rights Project said the latest ruling "perpetuates a clear injustice” and predicted future courts would reject the idea that only humans have a right to liberty.
“As with other social justice movements, early losses are expected as we challenge an entrenched status quo that has allowed Missy, Kimba, Lucky, LouLou, and Jambo to be relegated to a lifetime of mental and physical suffering,” it said.