1.5 kg of rhino horns seized in Tan Son Nhat Airport

Three pieces of rhino horns weighing 1.5 kg were seized when they were illegally transported through Tan Son Nhat Airport in Ho Chi Minh City, yesterday. 
Pieces of rhino horns are seized at Tan Son Nhat Airport (Photo: SGGP)
Pieces of rhino horns are seized at Tan Son Nhat Airport (Photo: SGGP)

Customs officers and related agencies detected the amount of above-mentioned rhino horns and kept a 20 year old man with Vietnamese nationality as he entered the country from an African nation with the pieces of rhino horns in his personal luggage. 

The horns belong to two-horned rhino thus it is very valuable, costing around VND2 billion ($88,029) in Vietnam. They were hidden in kid toy’s boxes to escape customs officers’ notice.

Customs department is prosecuting the case for further investigation to find out more people in the ring.

Before, on April 2017, customs officers in the airport, the department of smuggling prevention called C74 under the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security and the police department's economic crime investigation division ( PC46) discovered also an illicit transport of rhino horn weighing 5 kg and over 4 kg  of elephant tusk products.

Related agencies have prosecuted those involved in the case.

 Rhino horn is listed in Vietnam Red Book, so it is among the goods that are banned from being imported to or exported from the country.
Specifically, specimens of white and black rhinos and elephants, as well as products made from their horns, are banned. Any other animals included in the list of the appendices of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES) are also not to be traded.
Accordingly, the Vietnamese government issued a directive banning specimens of rhinos and several other wild animals from being traded, exported or imported.

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