Kota Kinabalu: Sabah Customs has not ruled out the possibility that the 5,000kg of frozen pangolin meat seized in Sandakan last week, may have originated from Sabah islands, Sarawak or neighbouring countries.Its Acting Director Dr Janathan Kandok said the department suspected Sandakan is the collection centre before the suppliers meet up and smuggle it out of Sabah.
"In the latest case, over 1,000 packets of frozen pangolin meat were seized from a 40-foot long boat at Batu Sapi waters near Kg Bahagia at about 6.30pm on Dec. 7.
"This pangolin meat is believed to have medicinal benefits especially for men and it is being sold at RM800 per kg in the international market and RM150 per kg in the local market," he told Daily Express, Monday.
He was commenting on the seizure of 4,998kg of pangolin meat worth more than RM3.9 million in the international market during the department's "Operasi Sempadan" last week.
It was reported that the long boat was found transporting the semi-processed pangolin meat from Sandakan to the nearby Philippine island of Taganak.
Several men onboard jumped into the water to escape but Customs officers managed to apprehend one of them.
Last Wednesday's success was the biggest seizure of pangolin meat by Sabah Customs.
Last year, it was reported that 22,200 pangolins were killed in Sabah since May 2007 up to January 2009 and a total of 834.4kg of pangolin scales supplied to a syndicate.
This was revealed in seized logbooks from a wildlife trafficking syndicate.
Wildlife trade monitoring network Traffic said an average of 1,585 pangolins were killed monthly by the syndicate during the 14 months in Sabah alone.
