The image of five innocent tiger cubs that were found dead in the trunk of a car by Vietnamese police Tuesday afternoon, is as horrifying as it is heart-breaking.
Finding out that these sweet babies were killed to supply local buyers with the tiger bones that they needed to brew wine, is downright heinous.
According to vnExpress International, 26-year-old Bui Van Hieu, and 27-year-old Hoang Van Thien were arrested on the scene, explaining that “they were transporting the tiger corpses to a local buyer who would have used them to brew wine.”
Combined, the dried cubs weighed more than 22 pounds and were expected to sell for approximately VND70 million or $3,080.00 USD.
Police also detained 33-year-old Nguyen Van Chinh from a different car in which he was escorting the illegal transport along a National Highway.
The investigation is “continuing.” This demands numerous investigations into the many facets that make tiger bones an in-demand commodity which must be stopped.
Tragically, tigers are facing extinction in Vietnam, where the animals are trafficked for their meat, skin, claws, and other body parts such as, their bones, which are also illegally traded to make a gluey substance that some people falsely believe can cure arthritis and make them stronger.
To give you a taste of how horrific the situation is, data from the International Union of Conservation for Nature and National Tiger Surveys that was released two years ago showed that the number of wild tigers in Vietnam has shrunk to less than five, a significant decline from more than 100 in the early 2000s.
In January 2015, The Washington Post went undercover at one of China’s biggest tiger farms, the Xiongshen Tiger and Bear Mountain Village in the southern city of Guilin. The private Xiongshen Tiger Farm was established in 1993.
According to their report, a building located on the compound turned out to be where the tiger wine was sold to the public.
“Bottles of wine, in the shape of tigers, listed as one of the main ingredients is the bones of “precious animals.” Everything is designed to tell consumers this is tiger bone wine, without explicitly saying so,” noted the report. “Even the park admission tickets boast of government approval to make wine from “the skeletons of animals which have died of ‘natural causes’ to support the tiger breeding program.”
Natural causes?
My initial response to that, after disgust, was “how dumb do they think we are?”
Then, sadly, I remembered there is a sick market for this. Some view it as a status symbol. Somehow, there continues to be a demand for this. A select group of people profiting from the death and destruction that is hidden behind the shiny bottles with images of tigers and deceptive wording.
Some people even know what it means to have wine made from tiger bones and still want it, many with the misguided belief that the bones of tigers will make you stronger or give you a bigger libido
There seems to be no “we” anymore when it comes to instances such as this. There is only an “us” and “them.” The people who profit from killing these precious animals and those who want to protect these beautiful species for future generations.
This madness of killing innocent animals for their meat, bones, fashion, or for whatever false beliefs, has to stop, period.
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