Appraise to clarify the case of transport 300 kg fireworks at Lao Bao border gate

Customs and border defense force conduct to count the number of evidence. Photo: Lao Bao Customs.

According to Lao Bao Customs Branch, at 8:30 AM on 18/7, at the Lao Bao border gate, in the process of doing registration procedures for temporary entry from Laos to Vietnam for passenger car with license plate of Laos 0989 that was controlled by the N.N.L (address in Quang Binh province), competent forces noticed some suspicious signs, so they move the vehicle to headquarters of Lao Bao Customs Branch to conduct inspection ( According to Decision No. 110 / QD-HQLB dated 18/7/2017 of Director of Lao Bao Customs Branch.

In front of drivers and witnesses, Lao Bao Customs Branch in coordination with Lao Bao Border Station conducted a physical inspection in accordance with law. Through the inspection process, the competent found that there were packages containing suspected goods of firework with a total weight of nearly 300 kg. Those goods were hidden on the floor, the ceiling reinforcements, the passenger seats at the bottom of the car and baggage room of the car.

Thus, Customs authority has made a written record of suspending suspected goods and vehicle in order to prevent administrative violations and verify the circumstances for issuance of sanctioning decisions. Moreover, drivers claiming to transport the above fireworks from Laos to Vietnam with freight charges of 6 million vnd. Also, leaders of Lao Bao Customs Branch said that the exhibits were more likely to be fireworks, not firecrackers.

"According to the amending Law and supplementing a number of articles and appendix 4 on the list of business lines subject to the conditional business of Investment law, valid from 1/1/2017, all type of fireworks are conditional business except firecrackers. Therefore, if the inspection results are firecrackers, the authorities will handle criminal immediately. If the results were fireworks that are on the list of conditional goods, the authorities would continue to carry out the evaluation of the infringed goods. If the value of the infringing goods is more than 100 million vnd, it will be handled in criminal proceedings. If it is less than 100 million vnd, it will be handled in administrative violations. " leader of Lao Bao Customs Branch said.

For the above reasons, Customs authorities have not determined whether the case is smuggling or not.