More than 2,200 ants were found in Zhang Kequn’s luggage at Nairobi airport, with baggage destined for China
A Chinese national has been sentenced to a year in prison and fined by a Nairobi court for attempting to smuggle thousands of ants out of Kenya, a lucrative trade in east Africa that was exposed last year.
The insects are mostly destined for China, the US and Europe, where they become pets and can be worth about $100 each.
Ant smuggling made headlines last year when two Belgian teenagers were arrested in possession of nearly 5,000 ants, mostly stored in small test tubes. They were fined about $7,700.
Zhang Kequn, who evaded capture until his arrest on 10 March, had been linked to another case involving two people, one Vietnamese and one Kenyan.
