The World Customs Organisation (WCO) is expected to help National Board of Revenue (NBR) conduct a joint combat against identified local and international gold smugglers' syndicates operating through the country's airports, officials said.
According to the sources, the Detective Branch (DB) of Police has traced more than 11 local and international syndicates and another strong crime cartel, including some government officials, involved in the smuggling of the precious metal.
Bangladesh is allegedly being used as a route by international gold smugglers. And most of the gold consignments from the gulf countries are destined for a neighbouring country.
"We are going to jointly work with WCO to control the local and international gold smugglers as, in recent times, gold smuggling is all-time high," Director-General of the Customs Intelligence and Investigation Directorate (CIID) Moinul Khan told The Financial Express (FE).
The DG said they want to curb the rising gold smuggling through the country's airports as Bangladesh is being used as transit route to the destination.
He said the NBR and the WCO will formally start work jointly as soon as possible to collect information from international agencies to curb such smuggling.
The CIID chief has the intelligence that a large number of gold consignments are coming but only 5.0 per cent are caught due to internal conflict of the smuggling rackets. Although 95 per cent gold carriers are caught by the customs officials, the ringleaders remain unreachable.
According to the CIID a total of 412 kilograms of gold has been seized in last six months (January-June) at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA), Shah Amanat International Airport at Chittagong (SAIA) and Osmani International Airport in Sylhet.
Eighty-five persons were arrested in connection with the gold smuggling.
The CIID data show a crescendo in the clandestine trade as the customs intelligence personnel in 2013 seized some 520kg gold as against 25kg in 2012.
A yawning gap between the duty rates on gold imports in Bangladesh and in India creates scope for a windfall that lures many into the trading underworld, experts said.
Dewan Aminul Islam Shahin, general secretary of Bangladesh Jewellers Association (BJA), a platform of gold-ornament makers, said tax on every 10 grams of gold is Tk 150 in Bangladesh whereas it is as high as around Tk 4,000 in India.
The huge margins yield for the smugglers around Tk 0. 4 million profit if 1.0kg gold can be smuggled to India.
He noted that India is world's top gold consumer. But in 2013 the Indian government raised the import duty on gold to 15 per cent from 10 per cent, as a result of which gold smuggling increased significantly.
He said the gold smugglers are coming by airways and distributing the precious metal by road.
Sheikh Nazmul Alam, Deputy Commissioner of DB of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) north, said the syndicates individually or jointly commit gold smuggling through the airports.
He said they have identified seven syndicates at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, three syndicates at Shah Amanat International Airport (SAIA) in Chittagong and one at Osmani International Airport in Sylhet.
An officer of DB police said that, in recent times, law enforcers arrested more than 151 persons as suspects in smuggling gold and filed 80 gold-smuggling cases in 115 such incidents.
Several times the detectives also found some airline crews, civil-aviation officials, customs and immigration officials, security intelligence and Ansar members involved in gold smuggling.
The WCO is an international organisation headquartered in Brussels. It provides a forum for international cooperation to promote greater connectivity and more harmonious interaction, including the exchange of information and experience and the identification of best practices, between member- administrations, other government agencies, international organisations, private sector and other relevant stakeholders.
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