Elephant Rides Are Now Banned at Cambodia's Angkor Wat

[Beringia]

https://www.travelandleisure.com/animals/angkor-wat-cambodia-elephants

Cambodia’s most famous tourist attraction, Angkor Wat, will ban elephant rides around the ancient temples, beginning next year. After pressure from animal rights groups, the temples’ management group decided to stop offering elephant rides to tourists.

To start the initiative, two of the 14 elephants that lived and worked at Angkor Archaeological Park were moved to the nearby Bos Tham forest last week, according to the Khmer Times. The rest of the elephants that are in Angkor Wat will be transferred to the forest by early 2020. Visitors will be able to see the animals there but they will not be permitted to ride as the elephants will continue to be under the care of the company that currently owns them.

In 2016, an elephant named Sambo died at the park, due to a heart attack triggered by heatstroke and exhaustion. Her death prompted an online petition to end elephant riding at Angkor Wat, which earned more than 185,000 signatures.


(Petitions can work!)

[Polly Hennessey]

1. Good.

I have a few choice words for the tourists but will stay silent as I am not in the mood to listen to anyone telling me I love animals more than humans.