Brazil Gets Tough on Smugglers

The Federal Revenue agency has intensified its surveillance this year along Brazil’s border with Paraguay. Police officers and Federal Revenue agents are working in conjunction on the Cataract Operation, which is intended to contain the traffic of drugs, arms, and, most of all, illicit Paraguayan merchandise, which increases at this time of year because of Christmas.

According to the Federal Revenue supervisor in Foz do Iguaçu, José Carlos Araújo, 70 million contraband items were seized in October.


He said that the value of what has been apprehended so far represents US$ 2.94 million (8 million reais). Compared with the corresponding period of 2003, the seizure rate is up 88%.


Araújo revealed that some of the steps taken by the Federal Revenue this year to intensify the searches of buses that transport street vendors to Paraguay to replace their stock of merchandise have led to a considerable increase in the volume of cigarettes seized.


As a result, Paraná has become the most important state in terms of apprehensions. Between January and October, 1.4 billion cigarettes, worth US$ 5,804,364, have been removed from circulation. This represents 62% more than the amount seized all last year.


Agência Brasil
Translator: David Silberstein

Tags:

You May Also Like

Brazil Afraid Senegalese Immigrants Might Bring Ebola

The state government of Acre in northern Brazil has urged Brazilian federal authorities to ...

Killing Games

"I would leave him inside the bag for awhile and when I saw he ...

World Bank Offers a Helping Hand in the Brazilian Northeast

An agreement signed Thursday, July 14, with the World Bank (IBRD) assures the transfer ...

I Hate Those Hating Brazilians

One of the reasons given to explain why there are so many Brazilians in ...

Brazil’s Pelí© Pitching Artificial Soccer Fields

Artificial turf has  come of age, Brazilian soccer player Pelé told delegates at Stadia ...

Brazil Incensed with Criticism to the Construction of Belo Monte Dam

Earlier this month the Human Rights Commission at the Organization of American States (OAS) ...

Brazil Wants South Agenda to Dominate Doha’s G-77 Meeting

The reform of the United Nations (UN) and negotiations at the World Trade Organization ...

Industry Wants to Bar Chinese Goods from Brazil

The president of Brazil’s National Confederation of Industry (CNI), Armando Monteiro Neto, urged the Brazilian ...

Brazil Drafts Air Force Planes to Bring Order Back to Airports

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has ordered that the Brazilian Air Force ...

Brazil Clones Ox and Plans Cloning of Endangered Wild Species

Used in Brazil for the production of milk, meat, and for labor, the Junqueira ...