Noose tightens around Southeast Asia's illegal wildlife trade

Thai police strike at a criminal 'multinational' based in Laos, links to Africa, China

A file photo from Jan. 29, 2008, of Thai naval officers and forestry officials with dead tigers, leopards, and pangolins seized during a raid along the banks of the Mekong river in northeastern Thailand.

MARWAAN MACAN-MARKAR, Asia regional correspondent

January 30, 2018 14:00 JST

BANGKOK -- Boonchai Bach's world of impunity crumbled this month in Nakhon Phanom, the provincial town in northeast Thailand near the border with Laos from where he and his older brother, Bach Van Limh, allegedly used as a logistics and financial hub for Southeast Asia's massive illegal wildlife trade.

The 40-year-old Vietnamese-Thai was arrested by local police on Jan. 19, and his capture is expected to shake up the region's largest wildlife trafficking syndicate.