China is bringing home friendship envoy panda Ya Ya after 20 years in the United States, Chinese State Forestry and Steppe Administration said. According to the authorities, in the next few days, the female panda will be transported by plane to Shanghai, China.
Ya Ya and Le Le, a male panda who died in February this year, were closely monitored by the Chinese after allegations of ill treatment at the Memphis zoo were raised.
However, the accusations were refuted by the zoo, which said that Ya Ya has a chronic skin and fur disease, that "occasionally make her hair look thin and patchy."
Later, the Memphis zoo announced that the pandas would be returned to China, as its agreement with the Chinese Association of Zoological Gardens, according to which the pandas have been staying in the zoo, came to an end.
Panda Ya Ya was born in the Beijing Zoo on August 3, 2000. In April 2003, Ya Ya and Le Le were transferred to the Memphis Zoo as messengers of friendship.
Initially, the agreement on the stay of Ya Ya in the US was designed for 10 years, but in 2013 it was extended for another 10-year period. In December 2022, it was announced that China would return Ya Ya home after the two ten-year terms.
The big panda is an unofficial symbol of China. There are 1,600 pandas in the world, mainly in Sichuan province, south-west China. Only about three dozen pandas currently live outside China — in particular, in Russia, Austria, Australia, Germany, Spain, the US, Thailand and Japan.