Chinese customs officials seize thousands of dead pangolins

Nearly eight tonnes of endangered anteaters found on ship were destined for the dinner table, authorities say
Jonathan Watts guardian.co.uk 13 Jul 10;

Chinese authorities have intercepted one of the biggest ever hauls of illegally smuggled pangolins, which were almost certainly destined for the dinner table.

Customs officials in Guangdong boarded a suspect fishing vessel and seized 2,090 frozen pangolin and 92 cases of the endangered anteater's scales on 5 June, according to the conservation group Traffic, who have commended authorities for their work.

Police have arrested the six crew members, including five Chinese nationals who reportedly said they were hired to collect the contraband from south-east Asia and ship it to Xiangzhou port in Guangdong.

The other Malaysian crew member was said to have received instructions by satellite phone on where to rendezvous at sea to pick up the cargo. The smugglers were intercepted as they prepared to offload the nearly eight tonnes of pangolin to another vessel off Gaolan island.

According to wildlife groups, China is the main market for illegally traded exotic species, which are eaten or used in traditional medicine.

Pangolin meat is considered a delicacy and their scales are thought locally to be beneficial to breast-feeding mothers.

As a result of demand, the pangolin populations of China, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia have been virtually wiped out. With traders moving further and further south, the animal is declining even in its last habitats in Java, Sumatra and the Malaysian peninsula. It is a similar story for many species of turtle, tortoise, frog and snake.

China's customs officials have often been criticised for turning a blind eye to this trade, which supplies the demand for exotic food and traditional medicine, particularly in Guangdong.

The Guardian has twice exposed restaurants that illegally sell pangolin.

In recent years, however, there has emerged a small but growing conservation movement in the province.

In the latest case, the authorities have also won praise for a decisive intervention and for sharing intelligence with overseas enforcement agencies, including Interpol, the Asean Wildlife Enforcement Network and Cites officials.

"Guangdong customs are to be congratulated on this important action against wildlife smugglers operating between south-east Asia and China," said Professor Xu Hongfa, director of Traffic's China programme.

To encourage tighter enforcement, conservation groups say it is not enough to merely criticise lax regulation. The Wildlife Conservation Society held an awards ceremony earlier this year for Chinese officials who helped to expose the illegal wildlife trade.

In the far western region of Xinjiang, customs officers confiscated almost 8,000 horns of the Saiga antelope, an animal that is thought to have declined in the wild by more than 75% in the past 10 years. In the far northern Dalai Lake nature reserve, police were rewarded for confiscating 8,000 tonnes of aquatic products and 20 tonnes of medicinal herbs over the past nine years. In the southern, enormously biodiverse region of Yunnan, a forest police officer won an award for catching 7,110 criminals and rescuing five Asian elephants, 182 pangolins, 10 black bears and two pythons over six years.

But these reported successes are likely to be only a fraction of the illegal wildlife products that are killed and smuggled without detection across borders and inside China.

Huge pangolin seizure in China
TRAFFIC 13 Jul 10;

Beijing, China, 13 July 2010—Customs officers in Guangdong, China, have seized more than 7.8 tonnes of frozen pangolins and 1,800 kg of pangolin scales from a fishing vessel after it was stopped for inspection at Zhuhai's Gaolan Island.

International trade in Asian pangolin species is banned under CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora). Two of the four species are classified as Endangered by IUCN.

The suspect fishing vessel was sighted by a Guangdong Jiangmen Customs patrol boat in the Chuandao sea area late in the evening of 5th June and boarded in the early hours of the following morning when 2090 frozen pangolins each weighing between 1–10 kg and 92 cases of pangolin scales were found.

The crew were arrested and included 5 Chinese and a Malaysian national, who claimed they had been hired to sail the vessel from Xiangzhou Port, Zhuhai, to South-East Asia to pick up the illicit cargo.

The Malaysian crew member was said to have received instructions by satellite phone on where to rendezvous at sea to pick up the contraband. The smugglers were intercepted before they could transfer the cargo to another vessel off Gaolan Island.

“The use of satellite phones and trans-shipment of cargo at sea are indicative of the increasingly sophisticated methods being used by the organized criminal gangs involved in wildlife crime,” said James Compton, TRAFFIC’s Asia Pacific co-ordinator.

The Chinese authorities have shared intelligence on the seizures with enforcement agencies operating in the region, including INTERPOL, World Customs Organization (WCO) and ASEAN-Wildlife Enforcement Network, plus CITES officials and are seeking co-operation with Malaysia’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment on a joint investigation.

“Guangdong Customs are to be congratulated on this important action against wildlife smugglers operating between South-East Asia and China,” said Professor Xu Hongfa, Director of TRAFFIC’s China Programme.

“TRAFFIC stands ready to support international co-operation between enforcement agencies that will ensure those who organize and mastermind such wildlife crimes, as well as those who carry them out, are made to face the consequences of their actions,” added Compton.

A China Customs official quoted by the State news agency, Xinhua, noted that between 2007 and the end of June 2010 a total of 292 cases involving the smuggling of endangered species had been investigated in China. In total, 38,599 animal parts had been seized, weighing a total of 26.63 tonnes plus more than 55 tonnes of 2,753 rare plant varieties.