Chinese customs authorities handled 3,601 cases of smuggling in 2018, up 10.8 percent year-on-year, according to the work conference of General Administration of Customs on Thursday.
This is the result of the campaign "Guomen Lijian 2018" which aims to address smuggled foreign wastes, endangered species, and agricultural products as well as tax-related commodities, firearms and drugs. The customs authority said it will continue the campaign this year as well.
It is reported that the customs cracked 481 cases of foreign wastes, involving 1.55 million tons of wastes in 2018.
Another key area is endangered species and related products. Statistics showed that, in 2018, the customs investigated 175 smuggling cases of endangered animals, plants and related products, including 38 cases of ivory smuggling.
The authority also organized a special campaign to crack down on the smuggling of refined oil products, electronics, automobiles and wines involved in border e-commerce. A total of 175 smuggling cases involving more than 10 million yuan (1.48 million U.S. dollars) of taxes were investigated throughout the year, with a value of 34.34 billion yuan.
In addition, a total of 596 drug-related smuggling cases were investigated, and 4,610.1 kilograms of various types of drugs were seized. Eight criminal cases related to the smuggling of toxic drugs were investigated, and 32.9 tons of precursor chemicals were seized.
