Ivory, rhino horn seized in Vietnam

Confiscated elephant tusks contained in a box are pictured at the Northern port city of Hai Phong in 2009.

Confiscated elephant tusks contained in a box are pictured at the Northern port city of Hai Phong in 2009.

Published Aug 14, 2015

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Hanoi - Customs officers in Vietnam seized nearly three-quarters of a ton of elephant tusks and rhinoceros horn shipped from Mozambique, a customs official said on Friday.

The haul had a street value of about 5 million dollars, according to a Dat Viet news report. Phapluat newspaper said the haul consisted of 593 kilograms of elephant tusk and 142 of rhino horns.

Two containers, declared as “marble block” on the customs form, arrived Monday on a ship at Tien Sa port, Da Nang province, around 800 kilometres south of Hanoi.

Da Nang customs grew suspicious and tipped off police, who broke open the marble blocks Thursday to find the contraband, Dao The Nhut, deputy director of Da Nang Customs Department, told dpa.

Demand for the horn of endangered species among the wealthy has been partly blamed by conservation groups for a spike in rhino killings that reached a record 1 215 in 2014, 10 times the number killed in 2009, according to activist group WildAid.

Folk superstitions in Vietnam credit rhino horn with medicinal and aphrodisiac properties, and as a status symbol.

A single gram of rhino horn can fetch 133 dollars, compared with about 2 100 dollars for a whole kilogram of elephant ivory, according to reports.

DPA

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