Rio de Janeiro zoo was condemned to pay R$ 5000 (around USD 2500) due to moral injury to a visitor who has suffered an aggression by a chimpanzee, who threw a stone at her that harmed her forehead.

The visitor, Rejane Viana de Olimpio, denied she was teasing the chimpanzee, as the zoo had accused. Local Justice Court did not accept what the zoo argued, defining that it did not manage to prove that the visitor was teasing the chimpanzees with her behavior.

Once more it is proved that expose chimpanzees – for their intelligence and similarity with humans – to the disgrace of being exhibit to an audience, which most of the times is ignorant and tease them with screams and noises, not to mention the public humiliation, should end. Chimpanzees in zoos is just like to put primitive human beings in a cage and allow more developed humans observe and tease them, for they have different behaviors.

GAP Project is against the exhibition of great primates in zoos and demands that federal and local authorities do not allow this to continue. Zoos are like factories that produce great primates mentally disturbed. And later, when we try to cure and treat them we found that the damage is permanent. If the circuses cause physical injuries to the chimpanzees, the zoos mutilate their soul and castrate their spirit. It is time to put an end to this "freakness".

Dr. Pedro A. Ynterian
President, GAP Project International