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VIENNA, April 4, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Animal rights activists and leading experts in several biological fields including primatology and anthropology are joining forces to uphold a case going before an Austrian court which seeks a declaration of ‘human status’ for a 26 year old chimpanzee. According to media reports, the chimpanzee known as Hiasl was barely one year old in 1982 when he was illegally smuggled out of his birth place of Sierra Leone and into Austria to be used, along with several other chimps, for AIDS and hepatitis research at a laboratory near Vienna. Customs officials discovered Hiasl and...

Ancient Primates Thrived in...Texas? Associated Press April 3, 2007 — A team of anthropologists said their study of South Texas fossil deposits revealed evidence including ancient teeth that shows the area was home to numerous types of primates 42 million years ago. Lamar University Professor Jim Westgate and two colleagues announced the discovery of three new genera and four new species of primates based on their examination of material removed from Lake Casa Blanca International State Park near Laredo and the Mexican border. Westgate said the Laredo area was a coastal lagoon during the stage of geologic history known as...

He recognises himself in the mirror, plays hide-and-seek and breaks into fits of giggles when tickled. He is also our closest evolutionary cousin. A group of world leading primatologists argue that this is proof enough that Hiasl, a 26-year-old chimpanzee, deserves to be treated like a human. In a test case in Austria, campaigners are seeking to ditch the 'species barrier' and have taken Hiasl's case to court. If Hiasl is granted human status - and the rights that go with it - it will signal a victory for other primate species and unleash a wave of similar cases.

MADRID, April 26, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Amnesty International is shocked that the governing socialists in Spain have put forward legislation to grant great apes ‘human rights’.  The same government which stripped from unborn human children the right to life and permits destructive research on human embryos, has put forward legislation to grant great apes the rights the rights to life, freedom and to not being tortured, according to a report by Deutsche Presse-Agentur.Environment Minister Cristina Narbona, protested that the government was not giving apes human rights. “We are not talking about granting human rights to great apes,' but about...

MADRID - Spain's parliament is to declare support for rights to life and freedom for great apes on Wednesday, apparently the first time any national legislature will have recognized such rights for non-humans. The resolution prompted criticism and ridicule at first. Parliament is to ask the government to adhere to the Great Ape Project, which would mean recognizing that our closest genetic relatives should be part of a "community of equals" with humans, supporters of the resolution said. The move in a country better known for bull-fighting would follow a string of social reforms which have converted Spain from one...

Chimpanzees are capable of making spears to hunt other primates and have been seen using the weapons to apparently kill bushbabies for meat, scientists announced today. The researchers based their findings on observations of omnivorous chimpanzees that dwell in savannahs similar to those from which humanity's ancestors are thought to have emerged. "It is not adult males, but young chimpanzees, including adolescent females, who are exhibiting this behavior," Jill Pruetz, a primatologist at Iowa State University, told LiveScience. "This has important implications for how we think about the evolution of tool use in our own species," Pruetz added. "We have...

Should apes have human rights? By Tom Geoghegan BBC News Magazine Apes and humans have common ancestors but should they have the same rights? An international movement to give them "personhood" is gathering pace. What would Aristotle make of it? More than 2,000 years after the Greek philosopher declared Mother Nature had made all animals for the sake of man, there are moves to put the relationship on a more equal footing. Judges in Austria are considering whether a British woman, Paula Stibbe, should become legal guardian of a chimpanzee called Hiasl which was abducted from its family tribe in...