Johannesburg, July 10 (TIWN) A popular period drama on Chinese TV helped lead to the theft and brutal slaughter of millions of donkeys in Africa, a media report said.

It all started when fans of the show 'Empresses in the Palace' saw the aristocratic characters using a traditional Chinese medicine called "ejiao", which is made from donkey skin, the VOA report quoted Simon Pope, who works for UK-based charity the Donkey Sanctuary, as saying.

"It was all set in the (Chinese) imperial court and at a certain time of the day the ladies of the court would all say, Let's have some ejiao'," Pope told VOA.