PORT KLANG, Malaysia - Two containers from Tanzania containing 695 elephant tusks worth RM3mil were seized by the Malaysian Customs Department here on Friday, said Customs assistant director-general Datuk Zainul Abidin Taib on Monday. The shipments had stopped for transhipment in Malaysia with China being its final destination. On the Port Klang seizure, Zainul said they had sent a team to escort two containers suspected to contain elephant tusks, after being tipped off by Customs officers in Penang, to the department's marine enforcement store.
He said the seizure was the second in the space of a fortnight, with 664 elephant tusks worth RM2.3mil seized in Penang on Aug 19. The seizure in Port Klang weighed about 2,000kg, while the Penang haul weighed 1,586kg, he said.- All the tusks were hidden amongst recycled crushed plastic in the 20-foot containers.
- "The shipment was declared as 'recycle crush plastic' (sic) and was on transit from Dar Es Salaam Port to China," Zainul told reporters.
- A Customs team conducted a thorough check on the two containers, and found 92 plastic bags of tusks in the middle of the container, which was surrounded by recycled crushed plastic.
Zainul said it was possible that the same syndicate was behind the Penang and Port Klang cases as the modus operandi for both cases were similar."Investigations are ongoing to determine those involved. So far no arrests had been made for both cases," he said.
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