Team probes panda hunting cases

The central government is investigating reports that villagers were persuaded to hunt down giant pandas for their pelts, the Xinhua News Agency has reported.

A spokesman for the State Forestry Administration told Xinhua on the weekend that local forestry police had detected several cases of such illegal activities around Ya'an city in Sichuan Province.

"We have sent a working group to supervise the investigations and we will thoroughly investigate the incidents and prosecute whoever is involved," spokesman Cao Qingyao was quoted as saying.