Officers of the Kenyan Customs Services Department have arrested a Chinese tourist attempting to board a flight for Shanghai after finding a total of 510 genital organs from wildlife animals in his suitcases.
37-year-old Ming Zhang Wei was arrested this morning at the Jomo Kenyatta airport in Nairobi while carrying two suitcases full of animal penises.
The genital organs come from a variety of animals: 309 from zebras, 46 from baboons, 31 from buffalos, 27 from giraffes, 14 from lions and even 21 from pink flamingos.
A few penises were so badly preserved that their nature was impossible to identify.
Kenya Police Commissioner, Mathew Iteere, commented the case this morning, saying that more arrests could take place over the few days.
“We know that local poachers provide the Chinese black market with body parts from African wildlife. We hope this arrest could help us dismantle the entire network.”
According to Commissioner Iteere, this criminal network could have smuggled over 50,000 organs over the last few years.
“Our investigation has shown that Chinese couriers would transport similar quantities of organs by plane at least twice a week for the past two years. That means thousands of dead animals.”
Organs from wildlife animals around the world tend to meet a high demand in China, where traditional medicine often uses them to cure several aches and diseases.
Zebra penises, for example, are often dried, powdered and drank to cure impotency and increase the size of men’s genital organs.
Several animals around the world have seen their populations decrease as the high demand as brought the prices up and transformed illegal hunting into an extremely lucrative business.
Several animals like white and black rhinoceroses, African elephants, Siberian tigers and even North American black bears and deer have been victims of poachers in recent years.
Despite efforts to counter the phenomenon, most experts believe that poaching will probably increase by more than 200% over the next ten years, especially in Africa.
