BEIJING – Authorities are investigating a Chinese zoo where three dozen animals including 13 rare Siberian tigers died recently, amid charges it was harvesting their parts, state media said yesterday.
The probe of the zoo in the northeastern city of Shenyang will look at whether the animal parts were being used as ingredients in Chinese medicine and other products, Xinhua news agency said.China banned the international trade in tiger bones and related products in 1993, and is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (Cites), which also bars such trade.But such transactions exist as many tiger parts, such as penises and bones, are commonly believed to increase sexual potency or cure certain illnesses.Xinhua quoted a manager at the Shenyang Forest Wildlife Zoo as saying that the carcasses of the dead tigers, 11 of which starved to death and two of which were shot after mauling a worker, have been cut up and put in cold storage.- Nampa-AFP
