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Banker says stolen rhino horn a gift from friend

Banker says stolen rhino horn a gift from friend

Saturday, October 06, 2012, 11:11 GMT+7

Tram Be, whose a rhino horn worth six-figure was stolen in late September and who did not report the theft to police after the incident, says the horn is from a rhino he was gifted from a friend, and the animal have been legally imported. Be, who is vice chairman of the Board of Management of Sacombank, said he received the rhino four years ago with all necessary papers. The dead animal was stuffed and displayed at his house in the Mekong Delta province of Tra Vinh, before having its horn stolen. “I have faxed all of the legal papers of the animal to the CITES Management Authority of Vietnam,” he told Tuoi Tre via phone call. CITES, or Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna, manages the international trade of endangered wildlife, and currently provides a strict ban on the trade of rhino horns. The theft was reported to police on September 27 by the security guards at Be’s villa in Ham Giang commune, Tra Cu district, while the man himself didn’t contact the police at the time. The horn reportedly weighs about 4 kg and is valued at VND4 billion (US$191,000).

rhinoThe rhino is seen without its horn at the house of Tram Be in Kien Giang Province. Thanh Nien

The US-based Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) on Wednesday issued a document to the Tra Vinh Police Department providing its opinions about the theft, saying it believes that the horn could have been traded illegally before it was stolen. But Be asserted that the horn had been stuck with the whole body of the animal, not a separated horn that was allegedly traded illegally as WCS accused. “I don’t know if it is an authentic or fake horn,” he told Tuoi Tre. “As it was not separated from the rhino head, how could people say it weighs 4kg and is worth VND4 billion?”Not in importer list Be, however, is not in the list of legal importers of rhino horns to Vietnam, WCS and CITES discovered. “We do not see Tram Be in the list that contains more than 100 people licensed to import rhino horns from 2006 to now,” said CITES Vietnam deputy managing director Do Quang Tung. “Legal hunters usually keep the rhino horns to mark their hunting, and rarely do they gift the high-value horns to others,” he added. Interestingly enough, Ngo Thanh Nhan, residing in Ho Chi Minh City’s District 5, confirmed with Thanh Nien Newspaper that he granted the rhino with its horn to Be as gift for his new house in 2007. The newspaper quoted Nhan as saying that the animal was killed in a legal hunting at Mpumalanga, South Africa. “It acquires full papers when being imported to Vietnam,” he said. The men also present the import application of the rhino, including hunting license, import papers, tax receipts, quarantine application, and customs declaration. “I don’t know why the WCS suspects that the horn has been illegally traded.”

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