Over DZD 20.000 Million Were Smuggled By Five Foreign Airlines Since 2001

Investigations that were launched by the Central Bank of Algeria in coordination with the customs services in the case of the transfer of suspicious funds and financial transactions by foreign airlines, involved five dealers so far in the smuggling of more than 20.000 million DZD since 2001, while the investigations in this scandal are continuing since December,20, 2016.

Echorouk sources revealed that it comes to 4 European airlines and an Arab airline, among eight companies which are included in the investigation, while the concerned airlines remain under investigation, before identifying all the dealers which are involved, and the total financial value that was transferred abroad.

“Committee that was created by the Central Bank of Algeria, in coordination with the customs, as it is the body that prepared the report, concluded that these companies resorted to fraudulent ways that enabled them to smuggle “hard currency” abroad by violating the laws that specify such banking transactions, including the operations to organize flights through airports. The financial value that was smuggled by these companies exceeded 20.000 Million DZD since 2001, the year when the central bank issued the instruction No. 05-2001 dated on Sept. 4″.

Investigations confirmed that the issuance of tickets for flights from overseas to Algeria that were paid in Algerian dinars belong to the the state departments and institutions, and local groups under the receipts request for the benefit of private persons who are subject to Algerian law and who are registered in the commercial register of the flights from abroad to Algeria in an exceptional way for the benefit of their foreign agents and technicians who are not residing in Algeria and who are invited to intervene in Algeria in the framework of the implementation of deals or offshore contracts in advance, in accordance with the applicable regulation.

Investigations that were launched by the Central Bank of Algeria, according to what was published by Echorouk earlier, are based on a report that was prepared by investigators of Customs at the international airport, Houari Boumedienne, that was raised to the Finance Ministry, which included serious facts about the excesses, in which a number of foreign airlines are involved, as they managed in the record time of smuggling large funds abroad, making big losses for the public treasury, as the report revealed the circumvent way of foreign airlines in smuggling money and transferring it abroad through the sale of tickets of some destinations in the Algerian dinar instead of hard currency that is beneficial to the state treasury, and using the tickets No. with the name of one person twice or several times.