On September 23, the Xiamen Customs Technical Center confirmed that the 80 river rays seized by the airport customs were South American river rays, which are protected species in Appendix III of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. This is also the first time this year that Xiamen Customs has seized live endangered aquatic animals entering the country without a license.
A few days ago, the airport customs conducted on-site inspection of a batch of ornamental fish from Taiwan. In the process of opening and dismantling the goods, a special type of fish marked with the word "Gong" and the warning mark of the scorpion on the outer packaging attracted the attention of the customs inspectors. Experienced customs officers found that although the shape of the goods named "Ornamental Freshwater River Stingray" is consistent with that of ordinary River Stingray, the white spots all over its body are very similar to the endangered controlled animal South American River Stingray, and the accompanying documents of the batch of goods do not have the non-endangered control certificate issued by the relevant departments in the export area, and there is a greater risk of endangerment, so the customs officer decided to send the goods to the technical center for species identification.
On September 23, the appraisal report from the technical center confirmed the judgment of the customs officers, the batch of "freshwater river stingrays" is a South American river stingray, for the river stingray family, river stingray genus, listed in the "Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora ( cites) Appendix III, for Colombia, Brazil and other South American countries hope that cites parties to help control their trade species. At present, the batch of goods has been handed over to the relevant departments for follow-up processing.
It is understood that the South American river stingray is a kind of freshwater stingray, fierce temperament, the tail handle has a tail spine evolved by the shield lin, when encountering the enemy, it will stab the enemy with the tail sting, and at the same time inject highly venom through the groove, which is very dangerous. Freshwater stingrays originate in the Amazon River in South America and are also found in Southeast Asia. (Reporter: Chen Yuetian)