An Austrian judge has turned down a request to appoint a woman as legal guardian of a chimpanzee, notes a report on the Nature site.

The Association Against Animal Factories went to court in an attempt to name a legal guardian for Hiasl, who was taken in 1982 from western Africa with several other young chimps. The chimps were to be shipped to a research laboratory, but did not have proper documentation and were intercepted by customs officials, according to Martin Balluch, president of the association. Two of them, Hiasl and Rosi, ended up at the Vienna Animal Protection Shelter. The shelter is in danger of being closed down, and people working there think the best strategy to protect the chimps would be to take on them on as legal charges. The judge, however, denied the request. She said that if she appointed a legal guardian for a chimp, then this might create the public perception that humans with court-appointed legal guardians are at the same level as animals.
Full report on the Nature site