Long An (VNA) ꦉ– Basing on VietnamPlus’s report, the task force of the Vietnam Forest Protection Department coordinated with the Forest Protection Sub-department of Region 3 and local police to check Thanh Hoa Market in the Mekong Delta province of Long An, seizing a big number of rare wild animals.

This was a surprise raid of the country’s largest illegal wildlife market. The confiscated individuals belong to the species listed in Group 1B of the Vietnam Red Data Book, which are rare animals in danger of extinction. However, right after spotting the presence of the forces, store owners swiftly stashed away their merchandise. When asked to let the officers check, they phoned their relatives to bring away the bags of animals like birds, monkeys, snakes, eagles, otters and iguanas to other places.

▨[WWF calls for permanent shutdown of wildlife markets over COVID-19 concerns]

Located at the end of this market, a shop named Yen Tam was found to have the largest supply of wild animals. Prior to the raid, scouts of the delegation had discovered a number of rare animals listed in Group 1B like otters, grey-headed swamphens, pythons and various kinds of snakes there. Realising the officers’ presence, the owner slipped the snakes and otters to a neighbouring closed store and said that was an abandoned kiosk so as to evade responsibility while swearing at the team as well as reporters in an attempt to hamper their performance of duties. After that, a leader of the Long An provincial Department of Public Security requested the police of Thanh Hoa district and Thanh Hoa town to work with local authorities to persuade shop owners to open their kiosks. Yet, these owners still refused to comply with the order. It was not until almost four hours later that the Yen Tam owner agreed to open the neigbouring kiosk. There, the team seized a smooth-coated otter weighing about 8kg, two monocled cobras weighing 5kg in total, three owls, one oriental ratsnake weighing 1.6kg, one mangouste weighing 0.5kg, and 30kg of radiated ratsnakes and other nonvenomous snakes. Later the same day, the team also seized three owls and found a number of wild birds with unclear origin at the Diem My store. All the confiscated animals were then handed over to the Saigon Zoo-Botanical Garden Co. Ltd for care and reintroduction to the nature. Meanwhile, the 30kg of radiated ratsnakes and other nonvenomous snakes were also given to this company to cull.

𒁃[Conservationists propose actions against COVID-19]

On February 16, many Vietnamese and foreign non-profit organisations like the World Wide Fund for Nature, Wildlife Conservation Society, Fauna and Flora International, Save Vietnam’s Wildlife and Animals Asia sent an open letter to Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc to propose actions to deal with threats generated by illegal wildlife trading and consumption. They pointed out that many pandemics over the last 20 years have connections with virus clusters in wildlife populations such as the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in late 2002 and early 2003, the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) that broke out in 2012, and the African swine fever. And COVID-19 could be among them. In response to the appeal and to comply with the Prime Minister’s directive on proactively preventing diseases and enhancing biodiversity conservation, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MoNRE) asked other ministries, ministry-level agencies, Government agencies, and provincial-level People’s Committees to boost communications to raise public awareness of illegal wildlife hunting, trading, caging and consumption, as well as risks of disease infection posed by the consumption of and contact with wild animals. It also asked law enforcement forces like forest protection, market surveillance, customs, border guard and police to enhance coordination in checking restaurants and businesses, prevent wildlife trading, and stringently deal with violations of relevant regulations. Besides, ministries, sectors and localities need to instruct wildlife breeding facilities to increase phytosanitary and sterilisation measures, minimise contact with wild animals, and keep in touch with local management agencies to stay updated with disease information, according to the MoNRE.

The following are some images of the raid of Thanh Hoa Market in Long An province: