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Aceh teenagers shot orangutan 74 times. Their punishment: reciting the call to prayer
Environmental activists have called for the two Aceh teens to be processed under the juvenile justice system instead of being sanctioned through extrajudicial diversion.
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Hope, a 30-year-old female orangutan that was discovered in March with 74 air rifle wounds, recovers in her cage at the Batu Mbelin Orangutan Rehabilitation Center in Deli Serdang regency, North Sumatra. Hope was discovered with her 1-year-old baby, which later died of malnutrition. (SOCP (Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme)/Castri)
E
nvironmental activists have condemned Acehnese authorities for resorting to extrajudicial diversion and issuing light sanctions to two teenage boys for allegedly shooting an orangutan multiple times with air rifles.
The two are being required to recite the adzan (Islamic call to prayer) for a month as community service.
High school students Ade Irfanta Sitepu, 17, and Salinsyah Solin, 16, residents of Sultan Daulat subdistrict in Subulussalam, Aceh, were accused of shooting a 30-year-old female orangutan named Hope 74 times with an air rifle in March.
Hope underwent veterinary treatment and is recovering, although she still has 64 "non-fatal" pellets in her body.
Much to the dismay of environmental activists, local authorities decided to settle the case out of court through intervention measures.
Representatives of the Aceh Police, the Subulassalam Social Affairs Agency, the Singkil correctional center and other relevant officials decided at a meeting on June 29 that the two teenagers were guilty of shooting Hope and would be sanctioned with community service.
The community service includes reciting the adzan for the Maghrib and Isya prayers for a month at a mosque in Bunga Tanjung village, Subulussalam, under supervision of officers from the local community center and the village administration.
