KANGAR: Perlis National Border Security Agency (Aksem) is checking further into how the baby orang-utans, tortoises and raccoons managed to be slipped out of the country to Thailand recently.
Its commander Syed Basri Syed Ali said the agency will obtain more details on the smuggling of the wildlife and arrest of a 63-year-old Malaysian who was alleged to have transported the animals from Perlis to Hatyai yesterday.
“We will get more information on the incident from our counterpart in Thailand and at the same time work out ways to prevent the incident from recurring in the future.
“If the suspect’s account was true that he was hired to transport the two baby orang-utans, 51 tortoises and six racoons from Perlis to Hatyai, Thailand for 1,000 baht (RM126), we will investigate what was the modus operandi he used,” he said when contacted today.
Syed Basri dismissed the possibilities that the animals, which were found packed into plastic boxes and suitcases in the suspect’s car, were sneaked out via rat lanes in Wang Kelian or Padang Besar.
He said based his observation on the topography of the rat lanes, the terrain was too tough to be accessed by car.