Elephants in Thailand ‘broken’ for lucrative animal tourism

A baby elephant being trained to kneel at the Ban Ta Klang elephant village in the northeastern Thai province of Surin. — Photos: AFP

Separated from their mothers, jabbed with metal hooks, and sometimes deprived of food – many Thai elephants are tamed by force before being sold to lucrative tourism sites increasingly advertised as “sanctuaries” to cruelty-conscious travellers.

Balanced precariously on hind legs, two-year-old Ploy holds a ball in her trunk and flings it towards a hoop, one of many tricks she is learning in Ban Ta Klang, a traditional training village in the east.