China seizes 156 mammoth tusks in huge ivory haul

The contraband was seized in late April at a border crossing in northeastern China’s Heilongjiang province bordering on Siberia, but the find was only announced this week by Chinese customs, state media said.

The haul, which also included two elephant tusks and a range of other animal parts, was hidden under a shipment of soybeans.

Eight suspects, including Russians and Chinese, have been arrested, the People’s Daily said.

China banned the sale and processing of elephant ivory last year after having banned its import in 2015.

This, along with global efforts to stamp out the ivory trade to save elephants from extinction, have led smugglers to turn to a stock of ancient mammoth tusks buried mostly in Siberia but also Europe and North America.

The People’s Daily said the shipment as a whole was one of China’s largest involving animal parts in recent years.

The official Xinhua news agency said the inventory included “two elephant tusks, 1,276 antelope horns, 156 mammoth tusks, 406 walrus tusks, 226 narwhal tusks, as well as gall bladders and bear teeth and 320 kilos of sea cucumbers.”

A wide variety of animal parts are sought after in China as traditional medicines or for other uses, while ivory carving is an ancient art in the country.

The latest seizure’s estimated value was 106 million yuan ($15.7 million), Xinhua said, adding that an investigation was under way.

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China seizes 156 mammoth tusks, 406 walrus tusks and over 1,000 antelope horns in huge ivory haul

Chinese customs authorities said they seized 156 prehistoric mammoth tusks from a truck entering from Russia in one of the country’s largest such hauls.

The contraband was seized in late April at a border crossing in northeastern China’s Heilongjiang province bordering on Siberia, but the find was only announced this week by Chinese customs, state media said.

The haul, which also included two elephant tusks and a range of other animal parts, was hidden under a shipment of soybeans.

Eight suspects, including Russians and Chinese, have been arrested, the People’s Daily said.

China banned the sale and processing of elephant ivory last year after having banned its import in 2015.

This, along with global efforts to stamp out the ivory trade to save elephants from extinction, have led smugglers to turn to a stock of ancient mammoth tusks buried mostly in Siberia but also Europe and North America.

The People’s Daily said the shipment as a whole was one of China’s largest involving animal parts in recent years.

The official Xinhua news agency said the inventory included “two elephant tusks, 1,276 antelope horns, 156 mammoth tusks, 406 walrus tusks, 226 narwhal tusks, as well as gall bladders and bear teeth and 320 kilos of sea cucumbers.”

A wide variety of animal parts are sought after in China as traditional medicines or for other uses, while ivory carving is an ancient art in the country.

The latest seizure’s estimated value was 106 million yuan (US$15.7 million), Xinhua said, adding that an investigation was under way.


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China’s ivory sales ban shows need for Asia-wide strategy

Ivory carvings have disappeared from view at Beijing’s liveliest antique market. “China no longer allows trading in ivory goods,” traders said on a visit in March. Some who previously specialised in ivory have switched to selling still-legal mammoth ivory carvings; others have shut down.

China, the world’s biggest importer and consumer of ivory, imposed a comprehensive ban on trade in ivory items at the start of January, in an attempt to halt demand that is driving rapacious poaching. The law is part of internationally co-ordinated measures to protect Africa’s elephants from extinction.

Enforcement has been serious, cutting off visible trading channels and hurting China’s formerly legitimate ivory sales and carving industry. Carving workshops have closed.

But similar touristy antique markets in neighbouring countries continue to sell elephant ivory – which makes enforcement harder. As conservationists expected, underground cross-border transportation of ivory is proving more difficult to shut down than domestic sales.

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Looming Ivory Ban Will Create a Mountain of Unsellable Antiques

LONDON — In his award-winning biography, “The Hare With Amber Eyes,” the British ceramic artist Edmund de Waal tells the story of his family through its collection of Japanese netsuke carvings.

Netsuke are ornamental toggles made mainly out of ivory or wood and used to fasten things to the sash of a kimono. Each one is “a small, tough explosion of exactitude,” as Mr. de Waal memorably wrote. Charles Ephrussi, a cousin of the author’s great-grandfather, bought a complete collection of 264 of these carvings from a Paris dealer in the late 19th century. Among them was an ivory netsuke of a trembling hare with amber-inlaid eyes.

Extraordinarily, the entire collection has remained intact, surviving World War II in Vienna, hidden in the mattress of a family servant. It spent further years in the apartment of an uncle in Tokyo, before being bequeathed to Mr. de Waal, who keeps it in his London home.

He writes in his book how a disapproving neighbor, surprised by the sight of such precious objects in a private house, suggested that the netsuke should be returned to Japan. “No,” replied Mr. de Waal. “Objects have always been carried, sold, bartered, stolen, retrieved and lost,” he said. “It is how you tell the stories that matters.”

Such stories of lives lived through material culture could be severely curtailed here in Britain, following the government’s announcement earlier this month that it would be banning the sale of items made with ivory. The measure is designed to protect elephants, the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said in a statement. A spokesman would not say when legislation would be brought before Parliament.

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