Hanoi (VNA) – Up to 48 wild animals were successfully rescued in December2019 thanks to close coordination between Education for Nature – Vietnam (ENV) andrelevant agencies.
Theanimals included 20 monkeys, 13 pangolins, eight mountain turtles, threewildcats, and one python.
OnDecember 17, police of Cam Lo district in the central province of Quang Tri have seized nine Sunda pangolins weighing 34.9kg in total while the endangered animals were being trafficked in the locality.
Nguyen Thi Thuy, a 50-year-old resident in Khe Sanh town of Quang Tri’s Huong Hoa district, was one of the two persons on thevehicle. Thuy said she had bought the animals from some ethnic minority peoplein Huong Hoa and hired driver Dinh Van Thai to transport to the province’s DongHa city to sell.
The pangolin is one of the most trafficked mammals in theworld.
Sunda pangolins are listed in group 1B of Vietnam’s Red DataBook, which means they are in danger of becoming extinct and are protected frombeing exploited or used for commercial purposes.
According to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Vietnamhas become a “hotspot” of wildlife poaching and trafficking. Statistics showthat the number of wild species and their populations in Vietnam are decliningsharply.
In the IUCN Red List updated in July 2019, the number ofspecies classified as “near threatened” and above in Vietnam is 700. Surveys in2016 also proposed 1,211 species, including 600 plant and fungus species and611 animal species, be included in the Red Data Book, much higher than the 2007assessment./.