Amazon India Agrees to Remove 'Animal Specimen' Items: Wildlife SOS

Wildlife SOS had recently found snares, traps, wildlife specimens and wild animal products being sold openly on Amazon and had started a petition campaign requesting the online giant to remove these items on compassionate grounds.

"As a result of these sustained efforts and petition launched by conservation organisation Wildlife SOS, the online retailing giant has finally sent a written confirmation to Wildlife SOS agreeing to remove all such items.

"They also confirmed that they had delisted close to 400 items from their website on the request of Wildlife SOS," the body claimed in a statement.

A statement quoting Rakesh Bakshi, Legal Director, Associate General Counsel, Amazon India said the company respects the efforts of Wildlife SOS to fight illegal wildlife trafficking and in response to their request it has pulled down 296 items that were listed in the 'animal specimen' category and 104 items under the 'snares/traps' category.

Wildlife SOS had found that Amazon website listed wildlife trophies such as rare sea shells, alligator heads, starfish, snake specimens, seahorses and tarantula spiders, scorpions among a host of others and cruel trapping equipment like snares and leg hold traps.

This discovery, shortly after Wildlife SOS's rescue of a wild sloth bear cub that had lost a limb and her mother to snare, prompted the start of a petition against the sale of cruelty by Amazon.

"The petition has since gathered over 9,000 signatures from animal lovers across the globe, even as the organisation pleaded with Amazon to take down the products," it said.

"Our efforts eventually paid off when two senior legal representatives from Amazon came to meet us at the Wildlife SOS headquarters in New Delhi and were showed the harsh truth about what snares and traps can do to maim, handicap and kill innocent wild animals.

"We gave a brief presentation to Amazon officials about wildlife crime in the country and the devastating effect this has on our natural heritage.

"The legal team from Amazon were visibly moved when we showed them the picture of Rose bear cub and her missing leg that was torn off by a snare. They immediately agreed to begin taking down these items and have enlisted our help in identifying them," Kartick Satyanarayan, co-founder of Wildlife SOS said.