Australian arrested for timber smuggling

AMBON, Maluku: West Southeast Maluku police personnel have foiled an attempt to smuggle hundreds of timber planks to Darwin, Australia.

A suspect, an Australian citizen named CJ, had been arrested recently and he is now being detained by West Southeast Maluku police, said Comr. Rudy Heru Susanto. Besides arresting CJ, the police also confiscated 303 planks of lenggua wood, 27 planks of merbau and seven planks of iron wood stored in his boat Dolphin, said Rudy. The Dolphin, which belonged to CJ, was also seized for investigation purposes.

"The suspect was arrested as he attempted to ship the timber planks to Australia without proper documents," said Rudy on Saturday. The timber planks are three meters long and five centimeters wide. -- JP