A restaurant manager in Qionglai City of southwest China's Sichuan Province has been sentenced to five years in prison for serving dishes prepared from rare and endangered wild animals.

Local forest police found a number of live or dead wild animals in the restaurant on April 9, including three giant lizards, one Yangtze alligator, five pangolins and one giant salamander, all under state-level protection.

According to the local court verdict, Wang Shaoyun, who opened the restaurant at the end of last year, violated wild animal protection laws and other regulations by serving dishes prepared from rare and endangered wild animals.

Wang was also fined 50,000 yuan (US$6,045).

(Xinhua News Agency August 6, 2003)