Vietnam police seize 40 kilos of bear paws on Lao coach

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Police in the central province of Thanh Hoa on Tuesday seized 40 kilograms of frozen bear paws on a coach with a Lao plate as it was passing through Ngoc Lac Town.

The coach was stopped yesterday morning. Photo by VnExpress/Lam Son

Police found 18 frozen paws carefully stored in two boxes. Coach driver Bui Thien Loi, 52, could not provide any legal documents for the paws, saying that a stranger had hired him to transport them from Laos to Vietnam.

The frozen bear's paws. Photo by VnExpress/Lam Son

The police said the paws come from the Malayan sun bear, which is listed as an endangered species.

It is the smallest bear in the world, weighing between 50 and 65 kilograms. It mostly lives in tropical forests in China and Southest Asia.

Malayan sun bears in Tam Dao National Park. Photo by VnExpress/Giang Huy

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