Riau Police have busted a group of hunters that slaughtered six elephants in Sumatra for their ivory tusks.
“This group is very cruel. They shot the elephants in the head and took the ivory. I suspect that they are part of a syndicate that operates in Riau and Jambi,” said the police’s special crime director Sr. Comr. Y.S. Widodo as quoted by the Antara news wire.
The police arrested eight hunters in Pekanbaru on Tuesday and confiscated a pair of ivory tusks and hunting weapons.
Widodo said that the two ivories that had been confiscated were from male elephants killed in the Mandau district in the Bengkalis regency. The suspects have confessed that it is not the first time that they had done such a hunt.
“The suspects said that they had just killed three elephants from Tesso Nilo National Park in Riau three days ago: one female and two males,” he said.
They told the police that in September they killed two elephants in Jambi and sold the ivories for Rp 8 million.
The suspects were charged under Article 21 of the 1990 Law on Natural Conservation, which carries a maximum punishment of five years in prison and Rp 200 million in fines.