Public help crack down on smuggling cases
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A member of the coast guard climbs a ladder to board a ship for an inspection.
Ti Gong -
The law enforcers use a strong beam to warn a suspicious ship on a law enforcement trip at night.
Ti Gong -
A member of the coast guard climbs up a ladder to board a suspicious ship for an inspection.
Ti Gong -
A ship which allegedly smuggles sea sand
Ti Gong -
A suspect identifies the smuggled sea sand.
Ti Gong
China’s Coast Guard said on Monday that it had discovered four ships smuggling goods so far this month based on reports from the public.
A total of 69 people were involved, with 17 now under detention and facing criminal charges, the coast guard said.
Members of the coast guard seized about 160,000 tons of sea sand and over 7,000 tons of coal with no source identification. The goods could have been sold for over 20 million yuan (US$2.9 million), it said.
The four ships are said to have either illegally turned off their automatic identification system (AIS) or frequently changed their AIS data to avoid being tracked down.
The coast guard in Shanghai said it had received reports of 122 such cases via their 95110 hotline this year and had solved 47 of them.
In 10 administrative cases, offenders were fined 553,000 yuan, while in 37 criminal cases, 371 suspects were caught with 36 ships seized.
Over 530,000 tons of refined oil, sea sand, coal, frozen meat and garbage from overseas worth about 200 million yuan in total was seized from the ships.
