Help Stop the Slaughter of Elephants and Big Cats

Wildlife traffickers went to extraordinary lengths to hide a massive haul recently intercepted by authorities.

In Vietnam, inspectors discovered nearly 1.2 tons of elephant ivory and 175 pounds of big-cat bones concealed inside a shipment of timber from the Republic of the Congo.

Congress can help stop the next shipment before more animals are killed. The United States already has programs designed to fight international wildlife trafficking, but Congress must make sure those efforts have the funding and resources they need.

The traffickers had hollowed out wooden crates, packed the animal parts in wax inside hidden compartments, then sealed them with wood to make the shipment look ordinary and evade inspectors. Specialized scanning equipment finally exposed what was inside.

Behind that staggering quantity of ivory are elephants slaughtered for their tusks. And experts warn that as tigers, leopards and other big cats disappear from parts of Asia, traffickers are increasingly sourcing big-cat parts from Africa to satisfy demand.

Vietnamese authorities deserve credit for catching this shipment, launching criminal proceedings and detaining suspects. But intercepting one shipment doesn't dismantle the international criminal networks responsible for killing and trafficking wildlife around the world.

The United States can help.

Congress has already recognized wildlife trafficking as a serious form of transnational crime. The bipartisan END Wildlife Trafficking Act supports international efforts to fight poaching, strengthen enforcement in partner countries and disrupt trafficking networks.

Those efforts need strong, sustained funding.

The latest seizure shows just how sophisticated traffickers can be — and why customs officers, investigators and conservation authorities need the resources and international cooperation necessary to stay ahead of them.

Wildlife trafficking isn't confined by national borders. An elephant can be killed in Africa, its tusks hidden inside a supposedly legitimate commercial shipment and transported thousands of miles before authorities discover the crime.

We cannot bring back the animals already killed. But we can make it harder for traffickers to profit from killing the next ones.

Please sign the petition urging Congress to fully fund and strengthen U.S. efforts to combat international wildlife trafficking and dismantle the criminal networks behind it.

The petition to Congress reads: Fully fund and strengthen U.S. programs that combat international wildlife trafficking, help partner countries enforce wildlife protections, and dismantle the organized criminal networks profiting from the slaughter of elephants, big cats and other threatened wildlife.
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Source:

https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/09/vietnam-seizes-1-2-tons-of-ivory-plus-big-cat-bones-hidden-in-timber-shipment/

Photo credit USFWS/Julie Larsen Maher/Wildlife Conservation Society