Trafficking in wildlife, especially pangolin, from Malaysia into Thailand
Traffickers in wildlife in Malaysia have increasingly switched to land routes instead of boat in their smuggling of endangered wild animals and plants from Indonesia and Malaysia into Thailand before being smuggled out through Laos into Vietnam and China, according to Somkiart Sunthornpitakkul, director of Wildlife and Plants Protection Office, and Prat Kongthong, chief of the wildlife inspection checkpoint in Padang Besar.
The two wildlife officials said that Thailand is just a transit for the smuggled wild animals, especially Pangolin anteaters which are a favourite delicacy by Chinese and Vietnamese.
Prat noted that along a 12-kilometer stretch of Thai-Malaysian land border between the Perlis state and Sadao district of Songkhla, there are 11 “risky” points where smuggles use to sneak wild animals into Thailand.
He said that most of the smuggled Pangolins were force-fed with flour and energy drinks in order to increase their weight so they can be sold at higher prices. But the fact that they were usually put together in crowded space and the long travelling time, the anteaters would mostly become so exhausted and would not last for long and the flour they were force-fed make the animals unable to digest.
During the past three years, officials have seized more than 500 pangolins and other rare species such as tiger, clouded tiger, orangutan, Indian star turtle and panther from the smugglers at the Thai-Malaysian border.
To stem the trafficking in wildlife, officials of the National Parks, Wildlife and Plants Conservation Department have received close cooperation from customs officials and the military in checking vehicles and luggage from Malaysia to look for the wild animals.
Trafficking in wildlife, especially pangolin, from Malaysia into Thailand - Thai PBS English News
