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Ten endangered elephants have been found dead under suspicious circumstances in a Malaysian wildlife preserve.

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Environmental officials believe the protected Borneo pygmy elephants may have been deliberately poisoned in the Gunung Rara Forest Reserve in the Sabah region.

Autopsies show the animals suffered severe hemorrhages and ulcers in their gastrointestinal tracts.

“The death of these majestic and severely endangered Bornean elephants is a great loss to the state,” said Masidi Manjun, Sabah’s environmental minister.

“If indeed these poor elephants were maliciously poisoned, I would personally make sure that the culprits would be brought to justice and pay for their crime.”

It is not clear, though, whether the poisonings were deliberate or accidental.

“We highly suspect that it might be some form of acute poisoning from something that they had eaten, but we are still waiting for the laboratory results,” said Sen Nathan, a Sabah wildlife department veterinarian.