Arms smuggling

Navy officer, wife, 2 others charged in China inflatable boat smuggling conspiracy

A U.S. Navy officer, his wife and two Chinese nationals have been charged with conspiring to unlawfully smuggle military-style inflatable boats to China, the Justice Department announced Friday.

Lt. Fan Yang, 34; his wife Yang Yang, 33; Ge Songtao, 49; and Zheng Yan, 27, were charged with "conspiring to submit false export information and to fraudulently attempt to export articles from the United States," according to the department.

Fan Yang was assigned to the Maritime Patrol and Reconnaissance Weapons School (MPRWS) at Naval Air Station Jacksonville and held a top-secret security clearance while working in a sensitive anti-submarine warfare unit, according to court documents obtained by Fox News.

Arms smuggling

German arms-maker accused of gun smuggling

Colombia’s decades-long civil war may be over, but the fallout is just reaching Germany today. Prosecutors in the northern German city of Kiel confirmed this week that they will press charges against five executives with Sig Sauer, a German arms manufacturer. They are expected to face charges of breaking German arms export controls by selling tens of thousands of handguns to the South American country in the last decade.

The accused include senior executives and export managers, according to spokesperson for the prosecutor’s office. Prosecution documents seen by the German broadcaster NDR allege the company illegally shipped 36,628 handguns to Colombia’s national police, via an initial shipment to a sister company in the US.

Sig Sauer is alleged to have made false statements on export license applications between 2009 and 2012, leading government officials to believe the guns were destined for the American marketplace. Yet prosecutors say the German executives had to know the true destination: Only German-made handguns could have met the specifications that its US subsidiary had brokered with Colombian police.

Arms smuggling

Poles, Swedes rid Europe of Slovak arms

In September 2014, Swedish police in Stockholm detained two drug dealers. Besides 15 kilos of hashish they found gun parts in a plastic bag. It turned out that the parts were from a Glock pistol legally bought in eastern Slovakia.

Further investigation revealed that a 32-year-old man from Sweden visited Slovakia at least once and bought around 230 weapons, Swedish daily Sydsvenskan reported in mid February.

A day earlier Polish police informed the public that it had dismantled a gang that was smuggling hundreds of Slovak weapons through Poland to other parts of Europe.

In Both cases foreigners took advantage of former Slovak legislation allowing foreigners to purchase deactivated weapons in Slovak stores, reactivate them in their homeland and sell again.

Arms smuggling

Four men accused of smuggling 110 illegal guns into New York

Four Virginia men have been indicted for smuggling at least 110 illegal guns into New York City this year, city officials said Monday, as they called for stricter penalties against crooks who illegally sell large arsenals of guns.

NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill and District Attorney Cy Vance stood behind a display of the weapons — which included a pink-and-black patterned pistol as well as an assault rifle like the ones used in Sandy Hook, Connecticut and Aurora, Colorado — spread across several tables at Police Headquarters as they made the announcement.

Clive Dixon, 28, sold 86 of the guns to one undercover NYPD officer in 15 separate deals over the course of eight months this year, Vance said. Emmanuel Dentmond, 22, Antonio Williams, 27, and Teal Holt, Jr., 27, allegedly bought the guns in Virginia and drove them up I-95 for Dixon to sell.

Arms smuggling

Border Police bust gun trafficking ring

According to the police, two of the men arrested, both residents of the southern West Bank city of Hebron, acquired military grade weapons and ammunition used by the IDF and smuggled them to the West Bank, where they were subsequently sold to various sources, including the Palestinian Authority.

The weapons and ammunition sold by the suspects were allegedly used in terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians and security forces. The police did not specify which shootings the weapons and ammunition were used in, or whether the guns and bullets used were supplied to the attackers by the Palestinian Authority.

The police said that the two men from Hebron were arrested while illegally staying in Israel, while another two of the detainees are residents of Israel’s south.

Arms smuggling

Border gun-smuggling arrests don't stop illegal from the United States

When Ariana Ramirez and Andrian Alvarez tried to cross the border from Nogales into Mexico, customs officers discovered their car was loaded down with firearms and ammunition bound for a drug cartel.

Officers found two assault rifles and six high-capacity magazines under the seat where Ramirez’s two infants sat, court records show. In the center console were more than 1,500 rounds of ammunition and a $930 receipt from the United Nations Ammo Company in Glendale. Another 1,500 rounds were tucked under the Ford Explorer and a dismantled .50-caliber machine gun tripod mount was stashed in the back seat.

Ammunition-smuggling busts at Arizona ports of entry — like this one – jumped 600 percent over the past two years, U.S. Customs and Border Protection statistics show. A total of 54,000 rounds and 25 firearms were seized at the state’s ports in fiscal year 2016, statistics obtained by the Arizona Daily Star through a public records request show.

Arms smuggling

Serbian Police Arrest Suspected Arms Traffickers, Find Big Weapons Cache

Serbian police have arrested 10 people suspected of arms trafficking and confiscated a large quantity of weapons in the country's north.

Interior Minister Nebojsa Stefanovic said on November 16 that the raids took place around the towns of Apatin and Sombor.

The cache included 30 kilograms of explosives, dozens of detonators, more than 100 hand grenades, 12 antitank grenades, two rocket launchers, automatic and semiautomatic guns, and ammunition, Stefanovic said.

He added that an investigation is taking place to determine whether the weapons were to be sold, and, if so, where.

Arms smuggling has flourished in the Balkans following the wars of the 1990s when many weapons were left behind.

Arms smuggling

Border gun-smuggling arrests ‘just scratching the surface’”

Ammunition-smuggling busts at Arizona ports of entry — like this one – jumped 600 percent over the past two years, U.S. Customs and Border Protection statistics show. A total of 54,000 rounds and 25 firearms were seized at the state's ports in fiscal year 2016, statistics obtained by the Arizona Daily Star through a public records request show.

But that's a small fraction of what’s actually getting across the border.

“It’s just scratching the surface,” said Jose Wall, a retired Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent who worked on arms trafficking into Mexico from 2000 to 2013.

Arms smuggling

U.K. Police Warn About Flood of Guns From Eastern Europe

Terrorists have tried to acquire guns from criminal gangs to carry out Paris-style atrocities in Britain, authorities warned Monday.

A flow of illegal weapons through Eastern Europe has led to a record level of gun seizures in London and prompted concerns that extremists could arms themselves for a devastating coordinated attack.

The terror threat level in Britain is officially set at "severe," meaning that an attack is considered highly likely. Officials say a dozen attack plots have been thwarted since 2013.

Temporary barriers, surveillance cameras on all Tube subway trains and greater use of cellphone alerts were among the security measures recommended for London in a major report submitted Friday to the city's mayor.

Lynne Owens, director general of Britain's National Crime Agency, said Monday that while automatic weapons remained hard to find in Britain, there had been increases in the availability of Baikal pistols and converted weapons from eastern Europe.

Arms smuggling

Drug Smuggling Routes Between Israel and Lebanon Used for Hezbollah Weapons

The arrests of half a dozen residents of an Arab village in Israel’s far north accused of smuggling collaboration with Hezbollah has drawn fresh attention to the Lebanese terrorist group’s efforts to work with Arab citizens of its reviled enemy.

The six men, all hailing from Ghajar, an Israeli town straddling the Lebanese border, allegedly ran a cross-border drug and weapons smuggling network with operatives of the Shi’ite group.

A joint operation between the Israeli military, the Shin Bet domestic intelligence agency and national police saw them arrested throughout September, suspected of smuggling explosive devices and drugs, conspiring with and gathering intelligence for Hezbollah, and planning attacks on Israeli civilians.

Arms smuggling

UK border security gaps could let terrorists bring in weapons, says report

In his report, released on Friday, Lord Harris, a Labour peer and former chair of the body that oversaw the Metropolitan police, says more can be done to make it harder for terrorists.

Firearms laws are tight in Britain, but there has been mounting concern among counter-terrorism officials about increased smuggling of weapons. Harris says: “In July and August the Metropolitan police recorded 202 firearms discharges, compared with 87 in the same months last year.

“In 2015, the National Crime Agency intercepted a boat travelling from France containing firearms obtained by a UK-based organised crime group. Our borders are not as secure as they should be and much greater efforts should be made to prevent the illegal transportation of weapons and people into the country.

Arms smuggling

Mexican president: Gun smuggling is top border issue

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto named the flow of weapons and illicit funds from the United States as major contributors to insecurity in the border region during his public comments with GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump in Mexico City on Wednesday. 

Peña Nieto said illegal immigration — which has been a major focus of Trump’s campaign — is a security challenge but said focusing just on the movement of people is a "clearly incomplete vision."

"Thousands of weapons enter Mexico illegally," Peña Nieto said. "That flow must be stopped."

Mexican politicians traditionally avoid interference in foreign politics, particularly on sensitive issues like gun control in the United States.

While the Mexican constitution guarantees the right to bear arms, most firearms are tightly controlled in the country. 

Arms smuggling

Arms smuggling suspects busted in operation in Lithuania, Spain

Nine Lithuanian citizens have been arrested as part of an international operation in Lithuania, suspected of ties to terrorism and arms smuggling, in addition to another 15 Lithuanians caught in Spain.

"Terrorism threats and arms have become a priority across the European Union following the recent events linked with terrorism," Edvardas Sileris, deputy police commissioner, told a Vilnius news conference on Monday.

The police confirmed turnover of around 50 unlawful firearms, with some of the weapons smuggled into Spain.

The arms smuggling scheme was led and arranged by Lithuanian citizens who have since been detained in Spain. One of the primary suspects is Darius Macianskas, a Kaunas resident who has a history of connections to organised crime. He had been wanted by Lithuanian police since 2012. A European arrest warrant was approved for his capture in 2015. Lithuanian authorities aim to have him extradited to Lithuania.

Arms smuggling

Police seize weapons 'en route to Swedish militants'

Five of the suspected weapon smugglers were seized in the towns Gradiska and Laktasi in Republika Srpska, according to its interior ministry. Authorities further stated that another person had "previously" been arrested in Sweden, while another two remained at large.

Five arrests were made by Bosnian-Serbian anti-terrorism officials on Thursday, said officials, after large quantities of military-grade weapons were found during police raids.

A spokesperson said the arrests were carried out as part of Swedish-run operation called 'Varg RS', but Swedish authorities would not confirm nor comment on the police raids.

"We have no comments to this information at present. We await more information from Bosnia," national police spokesperson Carolina Ekéus told the TT news agency.