Smuggler traveling from Thailand stopped with lizards, tarantulas, possums, authorities in India say

Indian customs agents have made the last “significant” crisis in the disappearance of a passenger from Thailand, said a government statement: nearly 100 creatures, including lizards, sunbirds and climbing opossums.

Customs officers said the passenger, who also transported two taretule spiders and turtles, “showed signs of nervousness” when he arrived at the financial capital of India Mumbai.

The seizure occurs after stopping a passenger Table of dozens of poisonous vipersAlso arriving from Thailand, earlier in June. They included 44 Indonesian vipers and were “hidden in recorded luggage,” Mombai customs said in a statement.

Wildlife in the last crisis included iguanas, as well as Kinkajou or honey bear – a small animal resembling a raccoon of Mexico tropical forests – as well as six “sugar gliders” – a sliding opossum found in Australia.

The photographs published by the customs unit have shown that the six sugar gliders have snuggled together in a basket, as well as a box filled with lizards.

“In an important operation, customs agents … intercepted an Indian national … leading to the seizure of multiple wild and deceased wild species, some of which are protected by the laws on fauna protection,” the Ministry of Finance said on Monday.

Disturbing smuggling trend

Trafficking in wildlife trade, which fights against smuggling animals and wild plants, warned a “very disturbing” trend on Tuesday in traffic trained by exotic trade in pets.

More than 7,000 animals, dead and living, have been seized along the air road in Thailand-India in the past 3 and a half years, he said.

Customs agents at Mumbai airport are more used to grasping gold, silver or smuggling cannabis – but cases of fauna crisis have recently experienced a gradual increase.

Customs officers seized dozens of snakes and several turtles of an Indian flying of Thailand earlier in June.

Among them, several vipers with spider horns, a poisonous species described only by scientists in 2006 and classified as “almost threatened” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Traffic said that its analysis has shown that if most of the cases imply that animals have been introduced as a smuggling in Thailand, more than 80% of interceptions occurred in India.

“The discoveries and diversity of almost weekly fauna on the way to India are very disturbing,” said Southeast Traffic Director Kanitha Krishnasamy.

Many of those captured were alive, which “shows that the clamor for exotic pets stimulates the profession,” she added.

In February, customs officials at Mumbai airport also arrested a smuggler with five Siamang Gibbons, a small monkey from Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

These small creatures, listed as in the process of disappearance by the IUCN, were “ingeniously hidden” in a plastic crate placed inside the passenger cart bag, customs officials said.

In November, the authorities found a passenger with a living cargo of 12 turtles.