Straughn: Customs on guard against drugs, guns

As Customs faces increasingly sophisticated attempts to smuggle banned goods into Barbados, Minister of Finance Ryan Straughn has stressed the department’s efforts to strengthen border security and prevent illegal firearms, drugs and other dangerous items from entering the country.

He spoke at a press conference at the Barbados Customs and Excise Department on Tuesday as the department celebrates its 121st anniversary.

Straughn said border security is one of three critical areas that Customs focuses on, alongside revenue collection and supporting legitimate trade

He acknowledged that the department is facing more challenges as people find new ways to bring prohibited goods into the country.

“Even though we’ve deployed as much technology as we can and we will continue to deploy more technology, nothing really beats human intelligence, and training our officers is part of that effort,” he said. “Therefore we will continue to improve on the training of our officers whilst deploying technology to try to make it easier for people to facilitate legitimate trade.”

Straughn stressed that firearms entering Barbados must have the correct licences.

“Barbados does not make guns,” he said. “No country in the region manufactures guns, and therefore you must have some licence, which is usually issued by the Commissioner of Police, to import guns into Barbados. If you are not doing so within that framework, then it is not legitimate trade in much the same way that illicit drugs, narcotics and other harmful substances, crystal meth and those types of things, which we’ve seen a significant increase across the Americas, is something that the customs department, working with the partners, try to make sure that we prevent from entering Barbados.”

His comments came a day after new Comptroller of Customs Lynette Padmore disclosed that Customs had seized 12 firearms, 15 magazines and around 900 rounds of ammunition, along with cocaine, methamphetamines and other prohibited items.

Straughn also warned that illegal imports can interfere with legitimate business operations, particularly at the country’s ports:

“Imagine all of us in the room here, we go down to shed 2 or shed 4 to clear something. I’m going to check my shipment, and I got a whole set of guns in there. Now imagine the disruption that has to happen because all of you behind me; the police got to turn up, and because there’s that type of action there, it disrupts everybody else’s business in the place who are doing legitimate things. 

“So these things really matter because, as you would appreciate, the police, customs, and everybody who’s involved in law enforcement, they’ve got to do their job to make sure that everything is done in the way that it should be.”  

The Minister underscored the need for compliance, noting that inaccurate or misleading declarations can have implications beyond just lost revenue.

Straughn gave the hypothetical example of someone hiding crystal meth among goods declared as vitamins, saying such activity could create both border security and public health problems.

“Compliance matters because we do not want to have a situation where we have more addicts in the community as would be the result of that because it is something that is of growing concern across the country and therefore it is compliance really matters with respect to then what triggers the activity in a particular place,” he said.

Straughn said Customs will keep working to balance border security with facilitating legal trade, while investing in technology and training to better detect banned goods.

(LG)