In yet another seizure of gold haul, Customs officials at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport yesterday seized 101 gold bars weighing around 12 kilograms and arrested three passengers of a flight coming from Dubai.
Israt Jahan, Assistant Commissioner of the Customs Department, said they seized the gold bars after searching bodies of the three immediately after a flight of Biman Bangladesh Airlines had landed in Dhaka around 10am. The flight from Dubai had a transit in Sylhet before it arrived in Dhaka.
The arrestees were Joynal Abedin, 32, Sabuj, 30, and Roman, 22.
“Customs officials, after becoming suspicious of the movement and attitude of the three, subjected them to body search while they were crossing the green channel. When we searched them, we found the gold bars,” said Israt Jahan.
“They hid the bars inside their shoes, belts and other places in their bodies,” she added.
According to Customs officials, the arrestees boarded on the flight from Sylhet during the transit. They suspect that the detainees were members of a ring involved in gold smuggling and they came to Dhaka from Sylhet in an attempt to carry the gold, smuggled into the country from Dubai, out of Dhaka airport.
Earlier on Tuesday, around 10 kilograms of gold were recovered and a passenger was arrested in this connection. Besides, officials seized haul of gold bars on several occasions at Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet airports over the past few months.
Meanwhile, police arrested one Nurul Islam with $40,000 dollars in his possession at the airport yesterday afternoon.
Inspector Shah Alam, officer-in-charge of Airport Police Station, said 50-year-old Nurul Islam was arrested around 3:30pm with the money.
Shah Alam said the arrestee failed to provide required documents on the seized dollars.
