AR-News: (Africa) Wily Smugglers Give Mother Nature a Raw Deal

[Animalara2003 at aol.com]

Chris Van Gass
Johannesburg 
Illegal international trade in insects, plants, animals, reptiles is a 
multimillion-dollar industry
ENVIRONMENTAL crime, which internationally ranks second after drug 
trafficking, has hit SA particularly Western Cape.

Four German visitors were convicted yesterday on charges of possessing 211 
stag beetles among a collection of 842 insects they gathered in Western Cape.
They intended smuggling their illegal collection out of SA for sale to 
international insect collectors.
In the US, collectors are prepared to pay between $5000 and 11000 for a large 
specimen of the rare beetle.
In Germany, a website listing the pickings of the illegal trade in insects 
has a price list running to hundreds of computer pages.


full story:
http://allafrica.com/stories/200401280175.html



"The world is a dangerous place,
not because of those who do evil,
but because of those who look on and do nothing.",
Albert Einstein

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