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Giant turtle freed from sorcerer's home in Ghana |
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| GHANA: April 22, 2003 | ||
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ACCRA - Ghana's navy returned an endangered giant turtle to the ocean after freeing it from weeks in a sorcerer's home, a wildlife official said.
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"We received a tip-off that this herbalist or juju-man had a giant green turtle in his possession at Tema," Gerald Boakye of the Ghana Wildlife Society told Reuters. "So we got the police involved and apprehended him and freed the animal back into the ocean," he said. Tema is Ghana's main port 18 km (11 miles) west of the capital Accra. Under Ghana's law it is forbidden to hunt, capture or eat giant sea turtles, which are threatened with extinction even though the country's sandy beaches on the Atlantic provide a favourite breeding turf for them. Animist beliefs are widespread in West Africa and parts of animals are commonly used as magic charms by sorcerers. Their eggs are often eaten by dogs and domestic pigs, whilst local communities eat their meat and use their massive shells as water holders or wall decorations.
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REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
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