KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian authorities say they’ve seized 23 pieces of elephant tusks and 301 kilograms (664 pounds) of pangolin scales believed to have been smuggled from Africa in a haul worth nearly $1 million.
Customs senior official Mohamad Pudzi Man said officials raided the Kuala Lumpur airport cargo warehouse Sunday and found the ivory in two boxes marked as “food stuff.” He said Wednesday that the ivory, worth 275,000 ringgit ($64,139), was flown in on an Etihad Airways flight from Lagos and transited in Abu Dhabi before arriving in Kuala Lumpur. He said that later Sunday, officials confiscated six sacks of pangolin scales worth 3.86 million ringgit ($900,291) shortly after it arrived on an Ethiopian Airlines flight from Congo. Mohamad Pudzi said no one was arrested and the case was under investigation.
