Smugglers built secret tunnel leading to Hong Kong, border officials discover
Officials said the 20-metre-long tunnel was built in a 'professional' manner equipped with rail track and wagon
Mainland smugglers dug a "professional" concrete tunnel into Hong Kong equipped with lights, vents, steel reinforcements and even rails to transport goods, domestic media reported on Wednesday.
The underground path had "one end in a rented garage in Shenzhen and another in a thicket of reeds in Hong Kong, totally concealed", said a report posted on the official website China.com.cn.
"It was dug in a totally professional way," it said.
Semi-autonomous Hong Kong, along with Shenzhen on the mainland, are both important trade hubs for the fast-growing and massive market. But the two have very different tariff systems.
The as-yet unidentified smugglers sought to exploit their proximity by building a 40-metre-long underground passage and installing a rail track and wagon with a block-and-tackle system to ferry goods such as cell phones and tablet computers.