A 22-year-old Vietnamese man will be jailed for 1 year and 3 months for smuggling eight rhinoceros horns worth $1.7 million through Singapore.
According to Channel NewsAsia, the horns were discovered in his luggage bag in Jan. 10 when he was in transit to Laos from Dubai at Changi Airport.
The man was subsequently arrested and investigations showed that he attempted to bring the horns back to Vietnam for sale after purchasing them from Mozambique.
The man had also journeyed to other African countries before taking a flight from Uganda to Vietnam via Dubai, Singapore and Laos to bypass checks.
Experts from the Wildlife Reserves Singapore stated that the horns belong to a critically endangered rhinoceros species, the African black rhinoceros, which are protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
Source: Channel NewsAsia
Photo: AFP
