KUANTAN: The group of foreign poachers who were detained in Kuala Lipis on July 4 were described as ‘hardcore’ poachers targeting all types of wildlife, gaining lucrative returns in the black market.
Wildlife parts including tiger, clouded leopard and python skins; bear teeth and claws; kambing gurun (serow’s) tail and wild boar tooth; were seized from the wooden premises where the Vietnamese poachers, which included two women were nabbed.
A Wildlife and National Parks Department (Perhilitan) source said the group, which had been
actively involved in illegal hunting activities for several years, utilised a premises located near a sawmill to kill and harvest the animals before selling them to the middlemen.
He said the premises was equipped with a refrigerator that allowed the syndicate members to store the animal meat and other parts before they were being collected.
“The group had no specific targets (animals). They take anything found trapped in their wire snares. They seemed to be well-verse about their inhumane job and kept returning to the jungle for hunting.
“They have been in the business for quite some time as they could speak in Malay and they would supply all the wildlife animal parts to the middlemen who seems to be well-connected to the illegal wildlife trade overseas,” he said.
He added checks on the two full-piece of suspected dried Malayan Tiger skin revealed that one of them belonged to an adult while the other was a young tiger.
The source said the group might have been targeting mainly tigers in the area, but caught the other animals that ended up in the wire snares.
He said while only the tiger skin was recovered, it remained a mystery what had happened to the other parts of the animal, whether it had been sold for medical purposes.
“The enforcement team only found the serow’s tail; what happened to the other parts....the wild boar meat is likely to have been sold as exotic dish as only the tooth was found.
“The number of animals killed by the syndicate is unknown but it could be shockingly high especially looking at how they operate,” he said.
On July 4, Perhilitan in a special operation seized an estimated RM500,000 worth of protected wildlife animal parts in Kuala Lipis.
The foreigners are being investigated under the Wildlife Conservation Act 2010 (Act 716) for hunting endangered animals and possession of traps.
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