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Associated Press

Croatian police say two South Korean citizens have been arrested after trying to smuggle about 252,000 live eels out of the country.
The two, aged 38 and 47, were caught with the juvenile fish packed in eight suitcases, each containing tens of thousands of eels, at Zagreb’s international airport on Wednesday. The names of those arrested were not given.

They were arrested because European eels are a protected species. According to Croatian media, the market value of the smuggled eels was estimated at €180,000 (US$204,000).
Europe’s eels face oblivion as smugglers feed Chinese demand
Eels are commonly used in Korean, Chinese and Japanese cuisine and the dishes are popular but can be expensive.

Croatian authorities said Thursday that the two face charges of “destroying protected natural goods”. They could end up in jail if convicted.
The authorities said they had handed the eels over to the Zagreb zoo.


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Offbeat

Squirming surprise: two South Koreans arrested for trying to smuggle 252,000 live eels out of Croatia in their suitcases

File photo taken in November 2018 shows customs officers at Narita airport, near Tokyo, checking imported eels. (Kyodo) ==Kyodo

This photo taken on Wednesday by Croatian police shows one of eight suitcases containing tens of thousands of eels seized at Zagreb Airport. Photo: AP

Customs officers deliver HK$62 million blow to smugglers after seizing container on its way to mainland China full of ivory and pangolin scales sent from Nigeria

Hong Kong Customs seized about 7,200 kilograms of ivory tusks on July 4 from a container from Malaysia at the Kwai Chung Customhouse Cargo Examination Compound. 06JUL17 SCMP / Dickson Lee

Two customs officer stand guard next to the record haul of ivory and pangolin scales. Photo: K.Y. Cheng

Wildlife smugglers still at large after Hong Kong’s biggest ivory seizure in 30 years results in zero prosecutions

Hong Kong customs found 7.2 tonnes of tusks in a shipment of frozen fish in 2017. Photo: Dickson Lee

FILE - In this Sept. 29, 2013 file photo a game ranger stands next to a rotting elephant carcass poisoned by poachers with cyanide in Hwange National Park in Zimbabawe. Poachers in Zimbabwe have used cyanide to kill dozens of elephants for their ivory tusks. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi, File)

Ivory products are seem at Hollywood Road in Sheung Wan. 21DEC16 SCMP/Felix Wong

(FILES) In this file picture taken on July 6, 2017, a customs officer (R) stands guard next to seized elephant ivory tusks during a press conference at the Kwai Chung Customhouse Cargo Examination Compound in Hong Kong, following the city's largest seizure of ivory tusks in the last thirty years. Hong Kong voted to ban ivory sales in a landmark bill on January 31, 2018 to end the infamous trade in the city. / AFP PHOTO / ANTHONY WALLACE

Rhino horn Photo: Handout [FEATURES 2018]

Would-be smuggler who stuffed four kittens down trousers arrested by Singapore immigration officers

The four live kittens that had been in the man’s trousers. Photo: AFP

This undated handout picture released by Immigration and Checkpoints Authority of Singapore on January 8, 2019 shows a 45-year-old Singaporean man waiting in his car at the Tuas checkpoint in Singapore. - Singapore immigration authorities said on January8 they had foiled a bid to smuggle four kittens into the city-state stuffed down a man's trousers after hearing meows coming from the suspect's crotch. (Photo by HANDOUT / IMMIGRATION AND CHECKPOINTS AUTHORITY OF SINGAPORE / AFP) / XGTY---- EDITORS NOTE ----- RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE   MANDATORY CREDIT  "AFP PHOTO / HO / IMMIGRATION AND CHECKPOINTS AUTHORITY OF SINGAPORE" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS   -   DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS

Europe’s eels face oblivion as smugglers feed Chinese demand

Glass eels fished from the Loire river in Cordemais, near Nantes, western France. Photo: AFP

In this image released by the Guardia Civil on Friday April 6, 2018, a civil guard works with some eels. Spain's Civil Guard says it has brought down a criminal network making lucrative profits by smuggling glass eels to Asia, a burgeoning illicit traffic that is worrying both law enforcement agencies and scientists. Four Chinese citizens, three Spaniards and three Moroccans have been arrested in Spain in an operation coordinated by the European Union's police body, Europol, and involving Spanish and Portuguese investigators. (Guardia Civil via AP)

Eels are broiled at a restaurant in Narita, near Tokyo, on July 20, 2018, as the day falls on "Doyo-no-ushi-no-hi," or the midsummer day of the ox, when Japanese customarily eat eels in the hope of beating the summer heat. (Kyodo) ==Kyodo

(FILES) In this file photo taken on May 2, 2013 a student from Mount Saint Mary's College holds a glass eel that was caught in the Quassaick Creek in Newburgh, New York as part of a project by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and Cornell's Water Resource Institute to monitor eel populations. - Billions of euros worth of critically endangered eels are being trafficked each year from Europe, ending up on tables in China and Japan in what campaigners say is "the largest wildlife crime on Earth." Stocks of European eel (anguilla anguilla) have plummeted 90 percent in three decades as mankind developed the wetlands and dammed the rivers it needs to grow and feed in, and experts fear criminal gangs smuggling the lucrative fish could push it to the brink of extinction. (Photo by STAN HONDA / AFP)

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The wriggling cargo, worth more than US$200,000, was intercepted at Zagreb airport


The wriggling cargo, worth more than US$200,000, was intercepted at Zagreb airport.


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