Chinese Customs seize 820 kilograms of smuggled pangolin scales on Monday. Photo: Courtesy of the General Administration of Customs

Chinese Customs seized 820 kilograms of smuggled pangolin scales on Monday and arrested nine alleged pangolin smugglers in South China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and East China's Anhui Province, the General Administration of Customs announced on Monday. 

This is the latest effort of Chinese Customs and police to crack down on the smuggling of wildlife and its products, give full support to the fight against the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic, and safeguard ecological security and people's health. 

China's top legislature in February impose a full ban on the illegal wildlife trade amid the fight against the COVID-19 outbreak.

The suspect, surnamed Wang, ordered a batch of pangolin scales from overseas for illegal profits, and asked gangs to smuggle them into China from areas that did not set checkpoints on the border of Guangxi, and then shipped them to the traditional Chinese medicine markets in Anhui and Henan provinces for profit, investigations showed. 

Authorities in several provinces are further investigating the case. 

Chinese Customs will crack down on the smuggling of wildlife and its products strictly, severely and quickly, and cut off the smuggling chains of wildlife and its products, it said. 

Global Times