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.
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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”.
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An adult female white bellied pangolin and her baby. Photo credit: Joel Sartore/National Geographic Photo Ark.
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More than 1 million wild pangolins have been killed in the last decade. Photo: Paul Hilton/WCS.
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The scales of the pangolin anteater are used in traditional Chinese medicine, despite having no proven medicinal effect. Photo: Alamy.
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