Customs catches smugglers with rare animals

Customs officials in Xiamen, East China’s Fujian Province, caught two men smuggling sugar gliders from Taipei on September 11, thepaper.cn reported on Tuesday.

The officers noticed that two passengers with light luggage appeared to be nervous. With thicker calves, they had difficulty in moving.

An inspection found that the two had tied body-colored stockings to their legs which were filled with living sugar gliders. Each man was carrying 60 gliders.

This is not the first case of smuggling of rare animals. Rare or cute animals are currently being smuggled into the mainland to be sold in the market as “exotic pets.” The trend of “exotic pets” started in the West and soon became popular in Hong Kong and Taiwan, thepaper.cn reported.

But these animals are banned from entry into the Chinese mainland as they may carry dangerous virus or cause bio-invasion.

Xiamen customs seized 94 sugar gliders from a ship arriving from Kinmen, a small island of Taiwan, on June 9.

In July, 70 long-tailed macaques were seized from smugglers in Nanning, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

A snake was found in an inbound international package declared to be an artifact in Hangzhou, East China’s Zhejiang Province.

The snake was identified as albino ball python on September 11.