Four boxes filled with dozens of poisonous cobras were found on a bus headed to Phnom Penh  yesterday, but the owner of the snakes remains at large.

Cheth Vanny, deputy chief of Battambang police, said the boxes, containing about 64 kilogrammes of snakes, had been confiscated by police yesterday morning at the Rithy Mony bus station in Prek Mohatep village, in Battambang district’s Svay Por commune.

Cheth Vanny said the bus driver had discovered the snakes under the luggage compartment when one of the boxes broke and they slithered out.

Police have  not yet identified the snakes’owner because there was no name on the boxes.

“The perpetrator had planned to transport the poisonous snakes from Battambang to Phnom Penh via the bus in order to export them for sale in Vietnam,” Cheth Vanny said.

“We are now working on researching and investigating for the arrest of the snakes’ owner,” he said.

The snakes, which are being kept at the provincial Forestry Administration, will be  released today near a lake in Banan district.