Vietnam police arrest Chinese group smuggling firecrackers
Sunday, January 13, 2019, 14:40 GMT+7
Police in northern Vietnam said they had detained a group of Chinese people for smuggling over two tonnes of firecrackers into the country on Saturday.
A Chinese man named Hoang Lam Hai, 33, and several of his compatriots were intercepted around 3:30 am on Saturday while moving 120 suspicious boxes along a border path in the Vietnamese province of Lang Son, which is next to China.
The authorities found the boxes containing more than two tonnes of firecrackers – a kind of firework whose production and use Vietnam has banned for over two decades.
This is the largest haul of firecrackers that the Lang Son police have seized.
Hai confessed to police that he had purchased the entire contraband at CNY31,000 (US$4,584) and was expected to deliver the goods to a Vietnamese person.
In Vietnam, transporting an ‘especially large’ amount of firecrackers – over 150 kilograms – involves public disorder charges and is punishable with a maximum of seven years’ imprisonment.
The Southeast Asian country has prohibited the use and production of firecrackers since 1995.
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