Farmers Get Imprisonment for Poisoning White StorksTwo farmers from northeast China's Jilin Province were sentenced to 12 years of imprisonment by a local court for being found guilty of killing by poisoning, 16 state-protected white storks.The court's verdict said that Xiao Zhijun and Xiao Zhiguo, both brothers, from Yanjiang Township of Zhenlai County, made a living by trapping and killing wild ducks. Last December, the two brothers threw poisoned baby fish into a stretch of wetland near Nenjiang River, killing 16 of the migratory white storks, an endangered bird species that are under state top protection in China, along with two herons and six wild ducks. After the incident, local forestry police found pesticide bearing severe toxicity for killing rare poultry and related injection tools in Xiao's home. Extracts from stomachs of dead white storks were proved to be identical to killer pesticide found in Xiao's home and remains left on the injecting tools. The Xiao brothers were thus convicted of the crime of poaching and killing rare and precious endangered wildlife and were both sentenced to 12 years of jail term. China launched 95 operations aimed at stopping the destruction of wildlife last year, dealing with 29,000 cases of violations and shutting down 2,325 organizations engaged in illegal propagation and breeding businesses across the country. |
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