A South African court has just sentenced a Vietnamese man named Xuan Hoang to ten years in jail for trafficking rhino horns, according to the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT).

A South African court has just sentenced a Vietnamese man named Xuan Hoang to ten years in jail for trafficking rhino horns, according to the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT).

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According to EWT and South African media, the sentence was pronounced at the trial on June 30, 2010. The court refused Hoang’s proposition to pay a fine rather than go to jail.

Hoang, 29, was arrested at O.R. Tambo International Airport in South Africa while he was transporting 16kg of rhino horns worth over $116,000.

Wildlife experts estimated that this volume of rhino horns can be priced up to $259,000 on the black market.

Since early 2010, 124 rhinos have been hunted down in this country, including five black rhinos, which are facing extinction. Last year 122 rhinos were killed in South Africa.

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