SHENZHEN Forest Police Subbureau said they had started an investigation into a woman’s Weibo posts claiming she had consumed pangolin, an endangered species protected by the State, according to the official Weibo account of the city’s Internet Information Office yesterday.

    The posts by “Zhanfang de Duoduo” were posted in 2011 and 2012, but have caught attention recently following reports that a Hong Kong businessman was entertained by Guangxi officials with a pangolin dinner.

    The Weibo user posted a picture showing the soup and pieces of meat seemingly from a pangolin in a small pot Sept. 8, 2011. She said that the soup had been made from eight kinds of animals, including pangolin, snake and swan. She also posted another picture showing a plate of fried rice and said that the rice had a sauce made from pangolin blood. The user posted again March 6, 2012, saying that she appreciated the pangolin soup prepared by her hospitable friend, surnamed Liao.

    The user deleted the above-mentioned posts after hundreds of netizens commented under her posts and chastised her for eating pangolin. Her Weibo ID showed that her location was in Shenzhen.

    The State Forestry Bureau responded on Weibo on Sunday, saying that the forestry department in Guangdong Province was investigating the case.

    Photos posted by another Weibo user in 2015 recently stunned the public. The user said that he had been invited by government officials in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region to eat pangolin in their office.

    “Showing off the delicacy of pangolins is showing off cruelty and ignorance,” the State Forestry Bureau said on its official Weibo account last week.

    According to the bureau, pangolins are second-class nationally protected animals, and people will be held legally responsible if their online posts showing the purchase, sale or consumption of nationally protected animals are found to be true.

    According to Chinese law, those who catch, kill, buy or sell pangolins or other State-protected animals could face a jail term of more than 10 years plus fines.

    (Zhang Yang)