A Chinese plot that took three million euros of black money a week out of Spain has been dismantled

Macro operation of the Civil Guard against money laundering at an international level.

Agents of the Central Operational Unit (UCO) have arrested 13 people this Monday, including seven considered ringleaders, and are investigating three others as alleged members of a criminal network that used a complex corporate structure in several countries imported from China of bazaar products to fraudulently generate huge amounts of cash that it later laundered out of Spain, as reported by the Ministry of the Interior.

The investigation has confirmed that the network, headed by citizens of Chinese origin, but in which Spaniards and Ukrainians also participated, was capable of transferring up to three million euros of black money per week to the Asian country by air or land.

Those arrested, among whom there are several businessmen settled in the Cobo Calleja industrial estate, in Fuenlabrada (Madrid), are accused of crimes against public finances, money laundering, membership in a criminal organization and document falsification.

In the operation, which has lasted more than two years and has included 40 company and address registries with the participation of more than 200 agents, more than five million euros in cash have been seized in different phases both in Spain and in other countries. countries.

However, sources close to the investigation highlight that this figure will increase considerably in view of the significant amounts of cash seized during the searches and that, according to first estimates, it exceeds one million euros.

The operation has been carried out in the provinces of Madrid - with the epicenter in the Cobo Calleja industrial estate in Fuenlabrada -, Barcelona, ​​Valencia, Castellón, Alicante, Málaga, Albacete, Cuenca, Toledo and Valladolid.

It is not the first investigation into a large money laundering scheme linked to the import of Chinese bazaar products.

In 2012, the National Police dismantled a similar one in the so-called Operation Emperor, for which 102 people are still pending trial.

The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office is asking for 47 years in prison for the alleged ringleader, Chinese businessman Gao Ping.

An agent of the UCO of the Civil Guard stacks banknotes seized after the searches this Monday in Operation Guanxi.

Sources close to the investigation recognize the similarities of the plot now dismantled with that of Operation Emperor, as well as certain differences.

“They learned from their mistakes,” these sources add.

On this occasion, the police device has been baptized as Operation Guanxi, in reference to the Chinese term that serves to describe the dynamics of networks of contacts and personal influences based on mutual interest, and it began at the end of 2021 after it was intervened in the municipality of Tarancón (Cuenca) a significant amount of cash that was supposedly going to be taken out of Spain irregularly.

The investigations revealed that behind this money there was a complex organization structured into several groups and with differentiated functions.

Furthermore, they maintained wide margins of autonomy among themselves: they were in charge of generating, storing and subsequently transporting significant amounts of cash away from the control of the treasury.

A first group was supported by “a broad corporate network supported by a real commercial activity of importing goods from China for subsequent sale and distribution in several countries of the European Union,” highlights the Civil Guard.

In Spain, the “main nucleus” of this part of the plot was located in the Cobo Calleja industrial estate, where a good part of the entries and searches were made this Monday.

This scheme imported hundreds of containers of bazaar items manufactured in China each year, the contents of which, for the most part, were not declared at customs;

Among the reasons were counterfeits of well-known brands of clothing and other products.

The subsequent sale of these merchandise generated a huge amount of cash that was not declared to the Treasury.

A second group in the plot was in charge of collecting this money in banknotes weekly and transferring it to “kindergartens” where it was packaged for subsequent transport out of Spain.

The main one of these “kindergartens” was also in Cobo Calleja, where the money remained for only hours, since once prepared it quickly left Spain by different means.

A third group was in charge of the latter, made up mostly of citizens of Chinese origin, but also of Ukrainian nationality.

The Civil Guard details that this money was given “two different destinations.”

On the one hand, they carried out money laundering operations for the benefit of the organization itself.

On the other hand, they made large amounts of cash “at the disposal of third parties and other alleged international criminal organizations to finance different illicit activities.”

UCO agents count the money seized in Operation Guanxi.

In both cases, the plot used what Interior calls in its note “cash extraction channels.”

A land era, for which they used their own trucks in which bazaar products were transported to other European countries for sale.

A transport company based in Poland and with connections to Hungary played a key role in this operation.

This was the channel through which the network managed to get two million euros a week.

The other was by air, through what were known as

mules

, people who hid the money in their luggage and left by plane for China.

Through this channel they sent one million euros a week outside of Spain.

The investigations have made it possible to verify that the money was destined for different countries and that the network had different companies formally based in Europe.

In its note, the Civil Guard highlights “the complexity, specificity and transnational nature of the events investigated” which has required “intense international involvement and cooperation.”

Thus, in addition to the Tax Agency and the National Fraud Investigation Office (ONIF), the European Union Agency for Police Cooperation (Europol) has played an important role, which has created an Operational Working Group for this investigation ( OTF in its acronym in English), which in addition to the Civil Guard has included police officers from Portugal, Germany, Romania, Belgium and Hungary.

The investigation is being conducted by the Investigative Court 2 of Tarancón, the town where the investigations began, although it is expected to be transferred to the National Court, the sources consulted point out.

Subscribe to continue reading

Read without limits

Keep reading

I am already a subscriber

_