KUALA LUMPUR: Police made progress last year in clamping down on the theft of vehicles which are subsequently smuggled into Thailand.
Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Mohamad Fuzi Harun said Malaysian police’s close cooperation with their Thai counterparts enabled them to bring the number of cases down by 40 per cent last year, compared to 2016.
Without divulging exact figures, Fuzi said the success is also the result of cooperation with the Aseanapol Secretariat, which focuses on cross-border crimes.
"Last week alone, Thai police confiscated 20 luxury cars worth a total of RM3 million which were smuggled from Malaysia," he told a media conference after the launch of the Aseanapol Secretariat's new office at the Bank Rakyat Twin Towers here.
Fuzi said that most notably, the cooperation led to the crippling of a local syndicate which had turned Thailand into a transit point for stolen vehicles, which were then smuggled into Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos.
He added that Thai police recently seized more than 100 stolen vehicles smuggled from Malaysia and handed them over to Malaysian police.
On other aspects of cooperation, Fuzi said police have a good working relationship with their Indonesian and Filipino counterparts in combating militants.
