By John Malay
The Cambodia Daily
A Cambodian official has disputed reports that 200 live Siamese crocodiles confiscated in Thailand on Wednesday had been smuggled across the border from Cambodia. The Associated Press reported that Thai customs officials seized the animate from a 10-wheel truck in Chonburi province. But Heng Sovannara, a deputy officer in the Fisheries Administration crocodile unit at Cambodia's Agriculture Ministry, said this may not be the case. "How could the Thais know that these crocodiles came from Cambodia and not their own country?" he said, and added that his unit is investigating the case. According to AP, the crocodiles were seized after Thai customs officials followed the truck for some 200 km. Officials stopped the truck and arrested the driver. They found a box full of crocodile skins along with a three-tiered shelving system filled with live crocodiles, with their jaws bound with rope, AP said, citing a statement from the Thai customs department Joe Walston, research coordinator for the Wildlife Conservation Society in Cambodia, said that the Siamese crocodile is critically endangered in the wild, but is widely farmed here. Despite the farming, smuggling continues because international trade of .the animal—which is prized for its skin—is tightly regulated under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, to which Cambodia is a party, Walston said.
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