Smart Society

Broken TV and computer screens lay piled at a garbage dump near a rice field in Vĩnh Phúc province, Vietnam. Photo: Kham/Reuters.

Sic transit gloria mundi

A man throws garbage into a bin full of discarded mannequin heads in Hanoi, Vietnam. Photo: Nhạc Nguyễn/AFP via Getty Images.

Waiting for Godot

Heads of mannequins lay by the roadside near an apartment and office project in Hanoi, Vietnam. Photo: Reuters/Kham.

Gangnam Style

Hanoi, Vietnam: Two hippopotamuses are fed pumpkins at Hanoi zoo. The zoo has been home to more than 800 animals of over 90 different species since it was built in 1976. Photo: Lượng Thái Linh/EPA.

A Right to Live

Bangkok, Thailand: Customs officials display one of 136 live pangolins and 450kg of scales that were seized Wednesday from two pickup trucks after the authorities received a tip off that it had been smuggled from Malaysia. Customs Department Director General Kulit Sombatsiri said his department has seized more than 2.9 tons of pangolin-related items this year worth more than 29 million Thai baht (US$870,000). Photo: Sakchai Lalit/AP.

Salt & Stone

A courier transporting a bust of Hồ Chí Minh to a customer in downtown Hanoi, Vietnam. Photo: Hoàng Đình Nam/AFP/Getty Images.

Ranking the Wishes

The recently-concluded 17th Conference of the Parties (CoP 17) of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), held in Johannesburg, South Africa has finally ranked the pangolin as the “most illegally traded mammal of the world”.

An adult female white bellied pangolin and her baby. Photo credit: Joel Sartore/National Geographic Photo Ark.

Zoosadism

• Damian Carrington, Pangolins thrown a lifeline at global wildlife summit with total trade ban, The Guardian, September 28, 2016

More than 1 million wild pangolins have been killed in the last decade. Photo: Paul Hilton/WCS.

What Not to Wear to Save the World

• Nick Davies and Oliver Holmes, Revealed: how senior Laos officials cut deals with animal traffickers, The Guardian, September 27, 2016

The scales of the pangolin anteater are used in traditional Chinese medicine, despite having no proven medicinal effect. Photo: Alamy.

Everyone helps hunt the poachers

• Oliver Holmes and Nick Davies, Revealed: the criminals making millions from illegal wildlife trafficking, The Guardian, September 26, 2016

The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species™

The Lady in Red

• Vietnamese Parliament to Be Headed by Woman for First Time in History, Sputnik, March 31, 2016

Nguyễn Thị Kim Ngân was elected Chairwoman of the National Assembly of Vietnam with 95.5 percent of votes after a poll in the country’s 500-strong legislative body early Thursday. She has a degree in finance and a masters in economics. She has been a member of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) since 1981 and of its Political Bureau in the mandates 11th and the current 13th. She has also served as vice minister of finance and of Commerce, as well as head of the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs. Photo: VnExpress.net.