WINNIPEG SUN (Manitoba) 11 March 05 Cobras missing from snake farm in Thailand believed to be taken for food
Bangkok, Thailand (AP): Eighty-two deadly snakes have apparently been stolen from a Red Cross facility in Bangkok, and police fear they were destined for the stew pot.
The 82 King Cobras had been kept with other poisonous snakes at the Red Cross's compound in downtown Bangkok, where they are milked for their poison to be used as serum for snakebite medicine. On Jan. 13, workers discovered that 32 cobras were missing. A week later, 30 more were gone. After 20 more snakes went missing on Feb. 2, Red Cross veterinarian Montri Chiewbamrungkiet filed a complaint with the police.
Police said Friday they suspect a Red Cross employee stole the cobras, which have never escaped through the steel nets enclosing the cement pits where they lived.
"The veterinarian said he believed that the missing snakes had already gone into cooking pots, and that the thief who stole them must be someone who knows how to handle snakes," said police Lt. Col. Vichien Vatchirasaeng.
Snake is regarded as a delicacy by many Asians - particularly Chinese, who believe it has medicinal qualities.
Ten workers at the facility were interrogated but denied involvement in the snakes' disappearance. Police planned to question them again next week with lie detector machines, Vichien said.
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/WeirdNews/2005/03/11/957448-ap.html
MAIL & GUARDIAN (Johannesburg, S Africa) 11 March 05 Thai police keep lid on mass cobra escape
Bangkok (Sapa-DPA) : Thai police revealed on Friday that they have been searching for 82 missing cobras from the Red Cross Snake Farm in the centre of Bangkok for the past three months.
The cobras, used to extract venom to treat snake bites, started to disappear in January, this year, said Police Lieutenant Colonel Wichien Watchirasaenglert.
The first batch of 30 snakes disappeared on January 13, a second of 32 cobras on January 21 and the last batch on February 2, he disclosed, confirming reports leaked out to the local press.
Police said they kept a lid on the news to assist their investigation.
"We've decided it must have been an inside job, because whoever took the snakes must have known what he was doing," said Wichien, who speculated that the 82 cobras, worth about 30 000 baht ($790) were probably sold to restaurants as exotic meat.
The head of the Red Cross Snake Farm, a popular tourist attraction situated on Rama IV Road in the heart of Bangkok, said he had never heard of a cobra escaping the farm during his 30 years at the institution.
http://www.mg.co.za/articlepage.aspx?area=/breaking_news/other_news/&articleid=199405
