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Clifford Lo

Five Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation (KCRC) officers have been arrested on suspicion of corruption after the seizure of $3.5 million worth of goods being smuggled into the mainland.

 The Independent Commission Against Corruption said the five were part of a syndicate which avoided mainland taxes by smuggling raw materials used to make cigarette filters.

 The four men and a woman, from the freight operations department, were among 11 people arrested in the operation.

 They were a freight operations manager, a senior freight operations supervisor, a freight operations officer, a freight terminal operator and a customer service officer.

 'We suspect the five KCRC staff accepted advantages or were directly involved in the smuggling activities,' said the ICAC's acting assistant director, Daniel So Ping-hung.

 He said it was the first time so many KCRC staff had been arrested in one anti-corruption operation.

 The other four men and two women arrested in the operation included the cargo owner and businessmen.

 Another key member of the syndicate, who is a mainland citizen, is still at large.

 Mr So said the syndicate used the same method to smuggle goods into China on two or three other occasions and the total value of the goods smuggled was believed to be about $11 million.

 He said the investigation was launched in June.

 The arrests came after anti-graft officers intercepted four carriages hooked to a cargo train transporting about 20 empty pig carriages at the Lowu depot at about 7.30pm on Wednesday. The train was about to leave for the mainland.

 Officers said each carriage contained 50 cartons of raw material for filters weighing one tonne each. Customs documents claimed the carriages were empty.

 A KCRC spokesman said a review of security measures would be conducted.

 The staff code had provisions on prevention of bribery. This included strict prohibition of receiving gifts.

 The 11 suspects were being questioned last night.



Seizure of $3.5m in smuggled cigarette-filter material led to swoop on freight