Every year, thousands of elephants in Africa are butchered for their highly-prized tusks to fuel a lucrative global trade and black market demand. The tusks are exported and smuggled into Asia, where they are turned into carved ornamental ivories. Malaysia is not spared as a transit point for some of the shipments but thankfully, checks at immigration points have deterred several of the illicit cargoes. The Royal Malaysian Customs Department has, since 2012, made seven seizures valued at RM19,805,132, according to director-general Datuk Seri Khazali Ahmad. “Up until 2012, all seizures of ivory were made at ports, in Klang, Pasir Gudang and Penang. But since 2013, seizures were made at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. We constantly monitor all points of entry as smugglers change their smuggling modus operandi to avoid detection.” Khazali says all seized tusks are kept by the department to facilitate investigations. It maintains stock records and these are verified during store audits. “Once the investigation is completed on our part, we will hand over the ivories to the Wildlife and National Parks Department (Perhilitan) for their disposal.
Posted on: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 07:52:37 +0000