A British animal charity has successfully banned eBay from selling – seahorses.
The Seahorse Trust lobbied the auction site to block the sale of the creatures.
The charity, based in Honiton, Devon, started the campaign after being alerted to seahorses being sold online.
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Millions of seahorses are sold illegally every year – often to the medicine trade in China.
But following the campaign eBay has now banned the sales of seahorses dead or alive on all its EU sites.
Director of the trust Neil Garrick-Maidment said he was “delighted”.
He said: ”All seahorses are legally protected and much of the eBay trafficking was illegal under EU and other international regulations.
“The sellers were based all round the world and were dealing with everything from living ones to seahorses entombed in paperweights and hideous baskets full of dried seahorses.”
Mike Carson of eBay’s Global Regulatory and Policy Management confirmed seahorse sales had now been banned on EU sites following calls from the trust.
The Seahorse Trust is now hoping its US arm, based in Arizona, California and Texas, will lobby eBay in America for a change in US law.
