Major victory in battle to protect Sumatran tiger, of which there are just 500 left in wild

This article is more than 10 years old

This article is more than 10 years old

Indonesia's forest rangers have notched up a major victory against tiger poachers with the arrest of a notorious figure who claims to have killed more than 100 of the endangered animals.

The man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, and his son were caught in a sting operation with the pelt and skeleton of a Sumatran tiger at Kerinci Seblat national park.

There are believed to be about 500 of the animals left in the wild, down from 10s of thousands at the beginning of the 20th century.

The 57-year-old suspect reportedly told police he had killed more than 100 tigers over a 30 year period.

His family is feared and respected in their village – Tunggang in northern Bengkulu – which has long been a centre of poaching, according to conservationists.

"He is very well known in the underworld," said Debbie Martyr, field co-ordinator for Fauna & Flora International's Kerinci tiger protection programme.

"For someone like this to get caught will put a chill down the spine of opportunist poachers. If these two can get caught, anyone can."

The arrests follow a two month undercover investigation led by rangers from FFI's tiger protection and conservation unit with backup from Bengkulu city police.

It is the third success in six months for the unit, which was established in 1995. Last November a tiger dealer and poacher were nabbed and later jailed for 18 months. A month later, another dealer was detained after a year-long surveillance operation.

Villagers can earn the price of a new motorbike for a tiger. But the deterrent of anti-poaching operations is starting to take effect.

"After 10 hard years, I'm not saying we are winning the battle, but we are holding our own," said Martyr. "We now have about 140 tigers in this national park. That is more tigers than in Laos, Nepal, Cambodia or China."

But, on the eve of the eve of International Day for Biological Diversity, the threat to the tigers is far from over. Even as the rangers celebrated one success, they were called out to try to save a tiger that had been shot and badly wounded by poachers.