Vietnam national park director fired for trying to close down bear sanctuary to make way for defence
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A national park director in Vietnam was fired for trying to close a bear sanctuary as it was allegedly getting in the way of "national defence", an official said yesterday.
Do Dinh Tien was replaced as director of the Tam Dao National Park by one of his deputies on Wednesday, Nguyen Binh Minh, a spokesman for the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, said.
The director was sacked for repeatedly obstructing the operations of the Vietnam Bear Rescue Centre since 2011, a ministry statement said, according to the Thanh Nien newspaper.
Last year, the ministry told the Hong Kong-based animal welfare group running the sanctuary, Animals Asia, that it must close down because the Defence Ministry had decided a planned expansion would get in the way of "national defence work". But it was later found that the director had lobbied with the ministry to block the expansion to give way to a hotel project in which his daughter has a 10-per-cent stake.
The Vietnam Bear Rescue Centre in Tam Dao National Park in Vinh Phuc province, about 70 kilometres north of Hanoi, hosts 104 bears confiscated from bile farms or given up by owners who kept them as pets.
The sanctuary has been hailed as one of the most successful conservation stories in the Southeast Asian country, which has a brisk trade in animal products and rapid deforestation.
