Kenyan Court Insurance Ant Smugglers up to $ 7,700 fine or a year in prison

A Kenian court has sentenced four men to a year in prison or a fine of $ 7,700 (£ 5,800) paid for trying to smuggle thousands of living ants from the country.

The four suspects – two Belgians, a Vietnamese and a Kenyan – were arrested last month with 5,000 ants in a guest house in the western city of Naivasha.

They had found guilty about the charges and the court told them that they gathered the highly sought after ants as a hobby and did not think it was illegal.

But the issue of the punishment on Wednesday, the court said that the specific collected species of ants was valuable and that they had thousands – not just a few.

It is believed that the ants were intended for exotic pet markets in Europe and Asia.

The smuggling where enclosed gigantic African harvester ants, which are valued by some British dealers to £ 170 ($ 220) each.

Belgian nationals Lornoy David and Seppe Lodewijckx, both 19, Vietnamese National Duh Hunguyen and Kenyan Dennis Ng’ang’A, were given similar conditions after the magistrate had considered their mitigatie arguments.

The Belgians were found with 5,000 ants, while Nguyen and Ng’ang’a had 300.

The Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), which is used more to protect larger creatures, such as lions and elephants, has described this as a “historical matter”.

The case showed a “disturbing shift in human trafficking patterns – from iconic mammals to less well -known species that are vital to ecological balance”, the KWs said last month when the four were arrested.

The Belgian teenagers had entered Kenya on a tourist visa and stayed in Naivasha, a city that is popular with tourists for his animal parks and lakes.

The KWS said that the demand for rare insect species grew.

In Kenya, the ants are protected by international bio-diversity treaties and their trade is highly regulated.