Police in Nghe An Province, north-central Vietnam have detained two men for unlawfully transporting an anesthetized tiger to Hanoi for sale.

Nguyen Tri Ngoc, 50, and Ngo Sy Thanh, 47, were arrested on Saturday on charges of illicitly transporting endangered, specious, and rare wildlife as per the Vietnamese Penal Code, the provincial police said.

Ngoc and Thanh had been caught carrying an anesthetized tiger weighing nearly 235kg without any documents in a truck in Quynh Luu District that day.

After stopping the suspicious vehicle for a check, police officers found the animal being kept under anesthesia in a metal cage in the vehicle’s trunk.   

The two men declared that they were carrying the animal to Hanoi for delivery to their partners.

Police officers have seized the truck along with two cellphones from the men and they are proceeding with procedures to prosecute the wildlife traffickers.

Police have also left the tiger in the care of professional staff while expanding their investigation into the case.

In August 2021, the provincial police seized 17 tigers illegally kept in captivity in two houses in Yen Thanh District, but nine died later during the transport from their captive place.

Currently, only two zoos in Nghe An are licensed by the authorities to raise tigers.

Tigers and many other wild animals are strictly banned from being traded in, imported to or exported from Vietnam as they are on the list of endangered wildlife protected by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), to which the Southeast Asian country has been party since 1994.

Transporting, trading, capturing or killing wild animals or parts thereof is a criminal offense in Vietnam punishable by between six months and 12 years in prison, according to the Penal Code.

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