International Wildlife Trade Authority Head Allowed Illegal Monkey Trade to Resume, PETA Says: Resign!

Published November 19, 2025 by Keith Brown.

3 min read

PETA is calling for the resignation of the top administrator of the only global treaty with the power to control the international trade in monkeys, at a time when the experimentation industry is systematically emptying forests of them.

The Secretary-General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) recently recommended removing Cambodia, Vietnam, and the Philippines from its review, meaning exports of monkeys from these countries could soon resume without restriction.

Baby Monkeys huddled together — Infant long-tailed macaques ripped from their mothers and kept in filthy concrete-block enclosures at a Cambodian monkey farm.

Baby monkeys clinging to a fence — Infant long-tailed macaques ripped from their mothers and kept in filthy concrete-block enclosures at a Cambodian monkey farm.

CITES is an international treaty aimed at protecting wildlife from exploitation. The Secretary-General leads the Secretariat, which serves as the administrative body, supporting the treaty through its decisions and actions.

The Secretary-General’s move runs contrary to the CITES mission. It contradicts the substantial evidence PETA and other groups around the world have given the organization, proving that widespread illegality, laundering of wild-caught monkeys as captive bred, and falsified breeding data to cover that up are plaguing the long-tailed macaque trade in Cambodia and Vietnam. Just this week, Thai authorities arrested two people who were hauling 81 macaques stuffed in net sacks toward the Cambodian border, the same net bags that appear in our documentation of Cambodian “captive-bred” farms receiving monkeys. Those apprehended admitted they were involved in a trafficking ring moving monkeys from Thailand to Cambodia.

PETA’s never-before-seen video footage exposes Southeast Asia’s cruel monkey trade, where crime, corruption, and smuggling are the modus operandi of companies that capture, breed, and sell long-tailed macaques, an endangered species, to U.S. experimenters who sicken them in deadly tests.

Allowing these countries to resume their corrupt monkey trade raises significant concerns about accountability within CITES. It shows that the Secretary-General is not acting in the best interests of global wildlife species or the organization’s stated commitment to protecting the world’s endangered species.

Monkey peering up from crate — Endangered long-tailed macaque inside a transport box at a Cambodian breeding farm, prior to shipment.

PETA strongly urges the immediate resignation or removal of the Secretariat’s Secretary-General, Ivonne Higuero.

It was bad enough that CITES simply ignored the obvious corruption in the Southeast Asian monkey trade, but the Secretary-General’s latest move completes the organization’s abdication of its stated principles. Higuero must go.

What You Can Do

Please TAKE ACTION and urge CITES to immediately suspend exports of long-tailed macaques from Southeast Asia.

Stop Monkey Imports from Southeast Asia