Hungry monkey kills baby in Malaysia

Not a good day for primates. As the news comes through that Charlie the Smoking Chimp has died of old age in a South African zoo, there's a report from Malaysia that a macaque monkey has killed a newborn baby by dropping her off a roof.

It happened in the central Malaysian state of Negri Sembilan.

The four-day-old baby's mother and grandfather were briefly out of the room when the monkey apparently entered the house, snatched the child and headed for the roof. There he bit the baby before dropping her to the ground.

According to the Star newspaper, the baby had been left alone for only a very short time. Her 26-year-old mother, V Revathy, had gone to the bathroom, and the bay's grandfather, A Valayutham father, was fetching a glass of water.

Unaware of what had happened, the baby's mother and grandfather searched the house before finding her body, covered in blood, on the ground outside.

There are two theories as to why the monkey became aggressive. One is that he was hungry, and thought the newborn child was food. The other is that he was attracted by a female macaque kept as a pet by the family.

Ishak Muhamad, national parks director, later told reporters that his staff had hunted down and shot dead the macaque they believed was responsible.

Charlie the Smoking Chimp's fate was to die of old age. But a post-mortem is to be carried out at the Mangaung Zoo in Bloemfontein, to discover whether his habit of smoking cigarettes left by visitors contributed to his demise.

However, given that Charlie lived to 52 when most chimps died at around 40, the cigarettes may not be to blame.

It is thought Charlie picked up the tobacco habit while he was employed by an American circus before his arrival at Manguang. ·