Free Republic

DECEMBER 17, 2009 Officials Probe Auckland Firm's Role in Seized Arms Cache By PATRICK BARTA, DANIEL MICHAELS and SIMON LOUISSON New Zealand officials are investigating whether an Auckland-based company has links to a weapons-filled plane from North Korea that was detained in Bangkok last week. Investigators are still unsure where the plane -- carrying 35 tons of missiles, explosives and other armaments -- was heading or who coordinated the flight plan. Its five-member crew, from Kazakhstan and Belarus, remains in detention in Bangkok and all five have denied knowledge that there were weapons onboard. Officials in Kazakhstan and the Republic...

/begin my excerpts Thai Jet Fighters Forced down the Plane Carrying N. Korean Arms Kwon Kyung-bok 2009.12.18 04:19 A Russian daily reports. The IL-76 freighter plane of Georgian registry which got caught while transporting N. Korean arms did not land on Thailand for refueling, but was forced down to land by Thai fighter planes after entering Thai airspace, according to Dec. 17 report by Russian daily Kommersant. The paper reported that, as soon as the IL-76 plane which left Pyongyang entered Thai airspace, two Thai jet fighters intercepted the plane and order it to land on Don Muang Airport in...

Caveats:1) The streaming video, located on THIS Japanese news web page, may only be up for a half day or so. The link could go dead, or could link to another, new story.2) Not all computer systems might be able to play the video. You might need Microsoft Silverlight installed, but probably most can see the short stream.3) Go to the link and hit the photo with the white triangle and stream. Now for the explanation of this important video taken today of photos of the cargo of an aircraft seized in Bangkok which was heading from North Korea...

God Bless those enterprising, digging Japanese journalists and their film crews.A hot one in North Korean black weapons smuggling case was captured for all of Japan to see last night at the 11 p.m. TV news on NNN Network.The pushy and curious Japanese journalists and cameramen with their long lenses (and fluent Farsi and Korean speaking investing staff in Tokyo), discovered some VERY interesting things about the North Korean aircraft stopped this week in Thailand with Ukranian crew flying weapons in violation of US sanctions. The flight crew has been very tight lipped, but the Japanese journalists nevertheless caught some...

NZ link to plane seized with North Korea weapons Liam Baldwin | Tuesday December 15 2009 - 03:42pm A New Zealand company has been linked to a cargo plane seized in Thailand suspected of smuggling North Korea arms this week, possibly to the Middle East. Agence France Presse (AFP) quoted Georgian officials linking New Zealand registered company SP Trading to renting the plane – an Ilyushin-76 aircraft – to deliver its cargo. The plane was seized at Bangkok’s Don Mueang airport late last week during a refuelling stop. It was discovered that it contained 30 tonnes of weapons from North...

Officials Seek Destination of North Korean Arms By THOMAS FULLER and DAVID E. SANGER BANGKOK, Thailand — A shipment of arms and apparently sophisticated missiles from North Korea seized here on a tip from American intelligence agencies has set off a series of investigations, as officials try to determine whether the cargo was headed to South Asia or the Middle East. The Obama administration welcomed the interception by the Thai authorities as evidence that it had scored a success in its effort to enforce a United Nations Security Council resolution banning weapons exports by the North Korean government, an attempt...

Shipment bound for Middle East Crew deny knowing plane carried weapons * Published: 14/12/2009 at 12:00 AM * Newspaper section: News The crew of the aircraft held in Bangkok after it was found to be carrying a large stock of war weapons say they planned to offload part of their cargo in Sri Lanka and the Middle East, investigators say. A police source said some of the suspects admitted after more than six hours of questioning that they planned to unload part of "the goods" on their way back to Ukraine. But they refused to name the buyers or locations,...

NEW YORK — A New York City woman who was caught smuggling monkey meat through Customs has been sentenced to probation. Mamie Manneh was arrested in 2006 after agents seized a shipment of dozens of primate parts hidden in a batch of smoked fish.

Thailand detains plane with weapons cache from N.Korea Sat Dec 12, 7:06 am ET BANGKOK (AFP) – Thai authorities have detained five people who landed in Bangkok in an east European cargo plane full of heavy weapons that originated in North Korea, officials told AFP Saturday. The plane's pilot requested to land at Bangkok's domestic Don Mueang airport Saturday morning, said government spokesman Panitan Wattanayakorn, and on inspecting the aircraft Thai authorities found the cache. "An eastern European airline asked to land this morning at Don Mueang airport to refuel its tank. When Thai authorities examined the aircraft they found...

STERLING, Va. - A close inspection by Customs and Border Protection officers at Dulles International Airport turned up something unexpected. Inside a fully-cooked chicken they found cocaine with an estimated street value of $4,300. The 60.4 grams (2.3 ounces) of coke was found inside two small, clear plastic bags inside the chicken's cavity. Officers discovered the white powdery substance during a secondary inspection after a flight from El Salvador arrived shortly after midnight Saturday. It tested positive for cocaine. "CBP officers have seen many unique narcotics concealment methods, and they all present the same challenges to discover them. Our officers'...

Arms smuggling heightens Iran fears U.N. BAN IS DEFIED Tehran may be building arsenal, helping militias By Joby Warrick Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, December 3, 2009 SHARJAH, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES -- The warning came almost too late. The freighter ANL Australia had already fired its engines for a 70-mile dash to Iran when customs agents here were alerted to a possible hidden cache of weapons on board. Inspectors from the United Arab Emirates quickly swarmed the ship and uncovered a truck-size container packed with small arms made in North Korea. Concealed deeper in the ship was the real find:...

A UN investigation has concluded that North Korea is continuing to export weapons, and using the hard currency obtained to import luxury items for the ruling elite of the communist police state. The UN report detailed North Korean use of false documents and the switching of cargo containers to different ships to throw off investigators. The North Koreans have also had to come up with a large array of subterfuges to get around growing restrictions on their use of the international banking system. The North Koreans are still getting the weapons out, and the money back. But they are increasingly...

Malaysia denied Tuesday any role in the illegal export of nuclear weapons to Iran but confirmed the involvement of a national in the export of potential military and explosive components. Deputy foreign minister A. Kohilan Pillay told AFP Malaysia was not a centre for nuclear weapons shipments to Iran. "Our country is not a centre for nuclear components or weapons or other weapons trans-shipments to Iran or anywhere else. We do not condone such activities," he said. Kohilan however confirmed Malaysian Brian Kaam and Iranian Majid Seif, who lives in Malaysia, along with two local companies, were among eight people...

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Swedish police have arrested two North Korean diplomats on suspicion of smuggling 230,000 cigarettes into the Nordic country, the Swedish Customs Office said Friday. The pair, a man and a woman who have diplomatic status in Russia, were stopped by Swedish customs officers Wednesday morning as they drove off a ferry from Helsinki, the Finnish capital. Customs officials discovered Russian cigarettes in the car driven by the couple, Swedish Customs spokeswoman Monica Magnusson told Reuters. The two North Koreans claimed diplomatic immunity. "They were accredited as diplomats in Russia, but had no accreditation in Sweden," she said....

/begin my excerpts [Weekly Chosun] Sino-N. Korean 'Intel War' /snip In October, 2006, when N. Korea did their first nuclear test, there were spies who sneaked in from Chinese fishing boat off the shore of Hwa-dae(near the test site.) They wanted to install GPS system in Hwa-dae and tried to obtain samples from N. Korea's nuclear test, but N. Korean State Security got them. N. Korea made no announcement to the outside about this incident. They nabbed the entire team and executed them without trial. According to a N. Korean defector, he was told by a security agent, "We found...

Smugglers In Iraq Have A New Trade: Corpse by QUIL LAWRENCE EnlargeJoseph Eid/AFP/Getty Images A tomb at the cemetery of Najaf in 2008. The Wadi al-Salam, or Valley of Peace, in Najaf is one of the largest cemeteries in the world. Millions of Shiite Muslims over the centuries have been brought here for burial from all over the world. text sizeAAANovember 4, 2009 Iraqi and U.S. officials have expressed concerns about the traffic of weapons and drugs across the country's porous borders, but there is also an older and more surprising commodity being smuggled into Iraq — cadavers. For centuries,...

A tip from an Albuquerque aircraft charter company led Moriarty Police to an airplane with an unusual cargo— suitcases full of more than $1 million in cash. Moriarty Police Chief Bobby Garcia said the two currency-filled suitcases seized from an airplane at the city's airport on Nov. 27 weighed more than 300 pounds. They contained $1,169,896, Garcia said Wednesday. No arrests have been made in the ongoing investigation. The events that led to the cash seizure began when a private plane requested an emergency landing at the Moriarty Municipal Airport due to engine problems around noon on Thanksgiving. Garcia said...

U.S. Border Patrol agents discovered a smuggling tunnel under the border in Nogales, Ariz., on Wednesday. It was the first passageway agents have found in the Tucson Sector in nearly four months. The 30-foot tunnel, 150 yards east of the DeConcini Port of Entry, was fortified on the Mexican side with shoring, but on the American side it appeared unfinished, U.S. Border Patrol spokes-man Mario Escalante said. The tunnel was not connected to the drainage system. Escalante said there was no evidence as to who was using the tunnel. "They already had an opening on the north side at the...

LAREDO, Texas -- A Texas Highway Patrol trooper found 5,408 lbs. of marijuana inside a school bus after pulling over the vehicle north of Laredo, Texas Department of Public Safety officials said. The driver fled on foot from the scene. The bus was marked to resemble a United Independent School District bus. DPS officials estimate the marijuana is worth more than $1.7 million. DPS continues to investigate leads in the case.

A shiny green Volkswagen, standing out among the rattletraps on Gaza's dilapidated roads, is the latest hot item to come out of the besieged territory's smuggling tunnels. Cars are brought in piece by piece from Egypt, which only opens its sole crossing point into Gaza for humanitarian purposes, because of an embargo imposed by Israel two years ago. A handful of the hundreds of smuggling tunnels in the Rafah border area are dedicated solely to the auto operation that started a few years ago. The entrepreneurs who run them say they've managed to bring in 30 to 40 vehicles in...

SAHL SINJAR, Iraq, Aug. 28, 2009 – Marine Corps snipers and designated marksmen have been operating across the vast Iraqi deserts since the outbreak of hostilities in 2003. As with all units operating in Iraq, past and present, they have found themselves evolving to meet the changing needs of the Iraqi military and political landscape. Small teams of snipers are finding reasons to venture into the constantly shifting environment that exists in a place referred to simply as “outside the wire.” “Working with previously gathered information, we gather additional intelligence and conduct operations watching over possible insurgent hot spots, caches...

The girlfriend of actor Cameron Douglas was arrested Monday for allegedly trying to smuggle heroin to him in an electric toothbrush, court papers show. Kelly Sott was busted after passing the toothbrush to Douglas while he was under home detention following a court hearing on his drug charges. She was arrested at the Hotel Gansevoort in Manhattan where she was staying. Douglas, 30, the son of actor Michael Douglas, was arrested at the same hotel last week and faces a methamphetamine-dealing charge. Douglas had been on house arrest at the New York home of his stepmother, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and went...

Human traffickers beware: The state of Texas has given law enforcement agencies and children advocacy groups more tools to come after you. That was the message given Wednesday morning at City Hall during a meeting hosted by Children at Risk, a Houston-based children advocacy group focused on bringing an end to human trafficking. "Texas has become the hub of human trafficking; Brownsville has become a gateway for human traffickers taking their victims to large cities like Houston and Dallas," said Bob Sanborn, the president of Children at Risk. "Now the Valley is the frontline in the fight against human traffickers."...

States across the U.S. have been taking a harder line against an old problem -- cigarette smuggling -- as part of the widening search for solutions to their budget problems. States including Florida, Maryland, Michigan, New York, Rhode Island and Virginia this year have stepped up law-enforcement efforts with the aim of recouping taxes lost to bootleg cigarette sales. Studies indicate states are losing about $5 billion annually in tax revenue because of illegal tobacco sales, said Phil Awe, who heads the tobacco-diversion division of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. "We do not want to have our...

"A shipment of nearly 9,000 Viagra tablets was confiscated during a routine check at a post office by customs officials near Malmö in southern Sweden."

The coin of the realm in the Big House - as penitentiaries are inevitably called in prison films - isn't money. Prisoners make only a tiny amount for their labor and are not allowed other valuables. Instead, they gamble and barter for supplies using . . . cigarettes. A sign of the times in all federal, and many state, prisons But not so much in real life any more. Last year, pressured by health advocates, officials banned smoking - even in exercise yards - in the nation's 115 federal prisons. And state pens - even in places like Florida, where...

For those who love a mystery, this story has more than one.  Italian authorities seized more than $130 billion in bonds from two Japanese nationals as they presumably prepared to cross the border into Switzerland.  No one can tell at the moment whether the bonds are genuine or counterfeit: Italy’s financial police (Guardia italiana di Finanza) has seized US bonds worth US 134.5 billion from two Japanese nationals at Chiasso (40 km from Milan) on the border between Italy and Switzerland. They include 249 US Federal Reserve bonds worth US$ 500 million each, plus ten Kennedy bonds and other US...

Open EU borders are a paradise for weapons and human smugglers, senior Danish police officers say. Senior Danish police officers are complaining that the EU’s open borders under the Schengen agreement have made it simple for criminal groups to smuggle weapons and women into Denmark. “The Schengen agreement has made it much easier to move weapons around Europe and to get them into Denmark. This is a problem as crime becomes much more serious when weapons are involved,” says Henrik Svindt of the Copenhagen Special Unit for Gang Crime and Women Traficking. The issue of how to stop weapons and...

KONAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan, June 8, 2009 – Task Force Chosin soldiers from 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, have been making a difference in disrupting timber smuggling in this lush area near the Pakistan border. Soldiers of 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, intercept illegal timber as it is smuggled through the Narang Valley in Afghanistan’s Konar province. Donkeys are the primary way that timber smugglers are able to export the timber without detection over the rough terrain of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. Courtesy photo  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. Konar has been a route of transit for smuggling goods from...

Federal agents have broken up a gun-smuggling ring in the Houston area that was allegedly sending weapons to criminal gangs in Mexico. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms has 100 additional agents in the border region for a 120-day special deployment under what is called “Project Gunrunner.” The ATF agents involved in “Project Gunrunner” are trying to locate and seize weapons before they can be taken over the border into Mexico and investigate past trafficking of guns as well. This week federal agents arrested eight of ten people indicted for smuggling guns that were later seized by Mexican authorities...

WASHINGTON—Acting Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Loretta King and Acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas Tim Johnson announced that Maximino Mondragon, 57, was sentenced today for his role in a scheme to smuggle Central American women and girls into the United States and to hold them in a condition of forced labor in the Houston area. U.S. District Judge Vanessa D. Gilmore sentenced Mondragon to 156 months incarceration, three years post release supervision, $200 special assessment and further ordered that he, jointly with his co-defendants, pay $ $1,715,588.05 in restitution to the victims. Maximino Mondragon is...

David Kushner from The New York Times reports on the increasing use by Colombian cocaine traffickers of self-propelled semi-submersible (SPSS) water craft to ship their loads into the United States: This kind of vessel — a self-propelled, semisubmersible made by hand in the jungles of Colombia — is no longer quite so mythic: four were intercepted in January alone. But because of their ability to elude radar systems, these subs are almost impossible to detect; only an estimated 14 percent of them are stopped. And perhaps as many as 70 of them will be made this year, up from 45...

Men and women wade out to smugglers' boats near Bossaso, Somalia, for the voyage across the Gulf of Aden 23 April 2009 – Thirty-five people drowned after one of two smugglers’ boats carrying more than 220 passengers across the Gulf of Aden from Somalia capsized off the coast of Yemen, the United Nations refugee agency said today. “This is one of the worst incidents to occur in the Gulf of Aden in recent months,” said Leila Nassif, who heads the Aden office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). “Unfortunately, more and more people are so desperate in their...

Mexican drug cartels have displaced the mafia as the "number one organized crime threat" in the United States, Sen. Joe Lieberman said Monday as his Senate committee heard testimony in Phoenix on border violence. Lieberman, an independent Democrat from Connecticut, and Sen. John McCain, a Republican on Lieberman's panel, told FOX News that the United States needs to step up the fight against the drug cartels. The two senators were in Arizona, McCain's home state, to hear from local officials on their advice for dealing with the drug-fueled violence many fear is spilling across the border.

The Israeli heroin market, worth half a billion dollars in 2008, is largely supplied by channels running through south Lebanon, according to estimates by the Anti-Drug Authority. Israel Police, who were able to stop only a fraction of the drug smuggling in the past year, said a significant portion of the funds made their way to Hizbullah.

FOB HUNTER — Iraqi and U.S. Soldiers recently joined forces to sweep areas in southern Iraq to deter the suspected smuggling of lethal munitions. “I really enjoy doing these missions with the Americans,” said a Soldier from the 41st Iraqi Army (IA) Brigade. Along the route, the Iraqi and U.S. Soldiers stopped in several villages where they handed out toys and school supplies to Iraqi children. “The looks we get from the Iraqis are priceless,” said Spc. Jesse Martin, a 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division Soldier. The Soldiers also distributed flyers with contact information for citizens to report...

SHATT AL ARAB — The Iraqi Directorate of Border Enforcement, Coastal Border Guard recently made a large drug interdiction here. “This was a significant event,” said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Steven Oluic, Ministry of Interior Transitional Team. “An individual was caught smuggling 71kg of hashish via the waterway.” Upon capture the individual was turned over to Iraqi Police. This multi-leveled operation began via intelligence channels, Oluic said. Oftentimes DBE border units observe ships offloading cargo to smaller boats which then cross into Iraqi waters to offload, he added. “There are also situations when we see larger ships departing home ports...

A Soldier assigned to 5th Battalion, 82nd Field Artillery Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, delivers a flyer to an Iraqi woman during a joint patrol with Iraqi Army Soldiers April 2. The flyer contains contact information for citizens to report on criminal activities. FORWARD OPERATING BASE HUNTER, Iraq - Iraqi and American forces work together to make Iraq a safer place. A joint operation recently was held for that purpose. Supporting 4th Battalion, 41st Iraqi Army Brigade's mission to prevent criminal operations in the Maysan Province, Soldiers assigned to 5th Battalion, 82nd Field Artillery Regiment, 4th...

In Switzerland pre-trial motions are proceeding in a case against several defendants tied to the Mafia who allegedly laundered over 1 billion in Swiss francs to finance an international contraband tobacco smuggling scheme involving the purchase of untaxed U.S. cigarettes. Organized crime also is involved in the contraband tobacco racket on the U.S.-Canada border. And advocates for changing the laws against marijuana and other drugs seriously contend that legalization will remove organized crime from the trade? The "tax it, regulate it" mantra rings hollow to the wise guys.

Environmental groups are blasting a U.S. Border Patrol project to kill invasive plant life along the Mexican border with what herbicide activists are calling the next Agent Orange — the Vietnam War-era deforesting chemical later found to cause cancer. But scientists say the chemical, a relatively common herbicide named Imazapyr, poses little threat to humans or native wildlife. The Border Patrol plans to spray the herbicide to kill Carrizo cane, which grows in dense thickets along vast stretches of the Rio Grande, which separates the United States and Mexico. Border Patrol supervisor Roque Sarinana calls the plant "a safety hazard...

All this flies in the face of news articles published by the U.S. media in the last week or two. Mexico's gun problems are a direct result of gun runners buying "assault weapons" in the U.S. and taking them into Mexico to arm drug cartels, says the U.S. media and government. That is a bunch of government and media nonsense. The cartels aren't arming themselves from U.S. gun stores with semi-auto AR15 and AK47 rifles. They've moved on up. Not to completely dismiss arms moving into Mexico from the U.S., but it is not as it seems when the U.S....

CAMPO, Calif.—Eleven people were injured when a vehicle possibly involved in smuggling rolled over near the U.S.-Mexico border in San Diego County's rugged eastern area. California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection Capt. Nick Schuler says the Ford Bronco rolled over less than a mile from the border around 1:30 p.m. Saturday. Schuler says it's not clear what caused the single vehicle accident. Two victims suffered moderate injuries and were flown to hospitals by helicopter. Nine others were treated for minor injuries. Border Patrol spokesman Jason Rogers says agents suspect the victims are undocumented immigrants who had just been smuggled...

I believe it is long past time to end the War on Drugs. That’s not because I approve of drug use or have any desire to encourage it. But this particular war has already gone on longer than the ones in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, put together, with no end in sight and far less to show for it. I would not only decriminalize drug use, I would give it the same legal status as tobacco and alcohol, and with the same age restrictions. For one thing, this would provide a great source of new tax revenue. Also, it...

PHOENIX — No longer stuck on the ground, drug smugglers are taking to the air by using ultralight aircraft to bring their drugs into the United States through Southern Arizona. Federal officials say the ultralights packed with drugs can evade radar by flying at treetop levels.

The entire crew of a South African Airways flight have been arrested on suspicion of drug smuggling - for the second time in a month. Fifteen members of the flight crew, including the pilot, were detained today at London's Heathrow after customs officers found five kilos of cocaine in a bag.  They were being held by officers after the class A drug, with an estimated street value of £250,000, was discovered as the crew tried to clear customs following a 12-hour flight from Johannesburg. Bob Gaiger, spokesman for HM Revenue and Customs, said the drugs were discovered after the...

Prisons are set to introduce bottom scanners in an attempt to stop prisoners smuggling mobile phones into jail. The £6,500 chairs are being put in 102 jails across Britain aimed to tackle a surge in phone smuggling. Prisoners will have to sit on the chairs, called Body Orifice Security Scanners (Boss), which bleep if they have a phone hidden inside them. They are then scanned in a non-intrusive manner and can also be used to detect drugs and weapons.

(IsraelNN.com) Following a meeting with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah on Thursday, newly-appointed American Middle East envoy George Mitchell called for open crossings into Gaza and greater Fatah involvement there. Talking to reporters after his discussions with Fatah leader Abbas and other PA officials, Mitchell said, "To be successful in preventing the illicit traffic of arms into Gaza, there must be a mechanism to allow the flow of legal goods. And that should be with the participation of the [Fatah-controlled] Palestinian Authority." Fatah is the faction currently heading the Judea and Samaria half of the Authority, while the...

Mexico slams Border Patrol clemency. Criticizes commutation for former Border Patrol agents Ramos and Compean. Plus, President Bush and Administration Corruption Exposed Part II 01.22.09 CNN Lou Dobbs Video: "Mexico Meddling" (Ramos-Compean, Bush Corruption Exposed Pt II) 01.14.09 CNN Lou Dobbs Video: President-Elect Barack Obama and Mexico's President Felipe Calderon met SEGMENT INTRO: New questions about Mexico's brazen meddling in the case against former border patrol agents Ramos and Compean who remain in prison tonight, we'll have special coverage of this continuing miscarriage of justice and the intervention of the Mexican government in the Bush administration's policy making. # And...

Although the Israeli air force bombed the Phildelphi corridor along the border thousands of times during the course of the Cast Lead campaign, smugglers acknowledge that some tunnels running under the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip have remained in use, and were in operation even during the fighting. Contrary to media reports, the Israeli air force apparently did not use more powerful bunker-busting bombs to destroy the tunnels, rather than regular explosives. Tunnels lined with wood reinforcement have been especially resistant to air force bombing raids. Smugglers manage to transfer merchandise, drugs and weapons through tunnels dug under...

“Lou Dobbs Tonight: Transcript” Justice Delayed: (Because of Bush) Ramos & Compean could be in prison for 2 more months Outrageous President Bush, Administration, and Mexican government collusion and corruption against our border patrol agents January 21, 2009 # This was Lou Dobbs first broadcast this week. SEGMENT INTRO: Former Border Patrol agents Ramos and Compean, their sentences commuted, but they may be in prison for another two months. There is rising anger at the continued imprisonment of former Border Patrol agents Ramos and Compean two days after President Bush commuted their sentences. And there is outrage at the Mexican...