The discoveries have come as authorities have been transferring 137 live tigers, mostly adults, from the temple to animal shelters after obtaining a court order.
Advertisement
Officials moved seven tigers from the temple on Monday and 33 on Tuesday, leaving 97 still there.
When the dead cubs were discovered, officials said they would be bringing additional charges against the temple. “But for what is beyond me”.
But the temple has denied animal mistreatment allegations and last week blamed Thailand’s wildlife division of abusing some of the animals after confiscating them.
National Parks and Wildlife officers examine the skin of a tiger at the “Tiger Temple”, in Saiyok district in Kanchanaburi province, west of Bangkok, Thailand, Thursday, June 2, 2016.
Tiger Temple has always been a popular stop-off for backpackers visiting Thailand, with visitors paying a fee to walk around with and take selfies with the animals.
Tiger’s body parts are used by the Chinese to prepare medicine or luxury goods for the elites and thus tiger skin is in much demand in the black market.
“Today we found tigers skins and amulets in a vehicle which was trying to leave a temple”, said Adisorn Noochdumrong, the deputy director of the DNP. They deny all allegations and had resisted previous attempts to remove the tigers.
The BBC reports that Thailand’s Department of National Parks (DNP) attempted to seize the tigers but multiple times the monks would not allow them to enter the temple.
For decades the infamous temple has been a popular stop for tourists who pay a steep fee to pet and be photographed with the predators – which animal rights groups say are heavily sedated.
Officials also found a dead boar, animal intestines in containers, and a number of deer horns in the freezers where the cubs were kept.
Wildlife officials say the complex is illegal. He said hearing the tigers would be moved was “news worse than [staff and volunteers] could have ever dreamed”.
The cubs were likely only a few days old when they died, and there’s no knowledge yet of how long they have been stored in the freezer.
Advertisement
The raid is the culmination of a battle that has been going on for years between the government and the temple.
