Thai navy officials in northeastern Mukdahan province today discovered nearly half a ton of garlic left lying unattended on the ground near the Kong River. The garlic was believed to have been smuggled illegally from Laos.
Rear Admiral Pisit Thongdeelert told reporters that he instructed his officials to inspect the area after receiving a tip-off that someone would be trying to smuggle a whole lot of garlic into the country without paying duty. (Fun fact: Thailand collects 60 percent duty for garlic.)
But instead of finding smugglers with a truck full of garlic, the crew arrived to find 21 bags of garlic, weighing in at a whopping 420 kilograms, simply left on the ground with no owners in sight, Sanook reported.
The THB20,000 (about US$622) worth of garlic will be sent to the Customs Department as evidence.
Believe it or not, this isn’t the first time officials have found ditched, and ostensibly smuggled, garlic this month.
On the morning of May 1, the same Mukdahan crew seized 1,700 kilograms of garlic (worth THB200,000, or US$6,220) at the border, after the men who drove the garlic across the border ditched their pickup truck and were able to “run away into the dark,” according to Thairath.
Gosh, these garlic smugglers sure are a slippery bunch. (rolls eyes)
The garlic and the pickup truck in that incident were also handed to the Customs Department. And so the um … mystery continues.
Reader Interactions