Jungle beckons for Dutch queen's 'child'

BALIKPAPAN, East Kalimantan (JP): The Samboja forest research station, about 30 kilometers north of here, will release 33 orangutans from its quarantine center to the wilderness today.

Karsono, chief of the Balikpapan Orangutan Society, said the orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus) would be set free in the virgin jungle near Mount Meratus, 160 kilometers north of here.

He said the event would be somewhat "special" because one of the primates to be let loose is named Beatrix after the Dutch queen who has adopted it.

"All of the orangutans have undergone three years of socialization in Samboja research center," Karsono said, adding that the event would be covered by foreign media.

It will start at 6 a.m. The animals will be transported by helicopter and then transferred to a speedboat and a truck before they are carried by volunteers to the jungle. They will be set free in an area sandwiched by forest concessions belonging to PT ITCI.

Official figures show the research center has "rehabilitated" 300 orangutans since it was established in 1991 and 108 have been returned to the jungles of Sungai Wain and Mount Meratus.

The primates were either taken from people who kept them as pets or were returned from Taiwan and Bangkok whence they were smuggled.

According to Karsono, the population has dwindled due to poaching and conversion of forests into development projects.

He dismissed fears that the jungle of Mount Meratus would catch fire as has happened in many areas in Kalimantan because, he said, it was monitored properly. (42/pan)