Over Bht22mln of ivory seized at Thailand's Suvarnabhumi Airport

BANGKOK, July 17 (TNA) - A shipment of African ivory worth over 22 million baht, smuggled from Kenya, was intercepted and seized by customs authorities at Thailand's main Suvarnabhumi International Airport on Tuesday. Thanat Suwatanamethakul, Deputy Director General of the Customs Department, told a press conference that the 158 elephant tusks, worth about 22.8 million baht, were discovered in six suspicious cartons sent as an air cargo from Kenya and declared as handcraft. Thanat said that the Thai customs authorities have confiscated all the smuggled ivory, as the shipment breached the UN Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), which bans all international ivory trade, and relevant Thai laws. (TNA)