LONDON: A cache of arms found by Indian police in a container at the port of Mumbai highlights fears that containers are being used to smuggle illicit weapons around the globe, security experts said on Tuesday. Mumbai police confirmed on Tuesday they had seized 37 revolvers, 1,280 rounds of ammunition and a silencer last Friday from a container that arrived from Singapore at the busy Jawaharlal Nehru Port.

The stash was hidden in 27 barrels of grease and bound for a local criminal gang, police said. They suspected the container — which arrived on May 11 — came from either Singapore or Dubai, in the complex web of international container trans-shipment trade.

“Containers are going to be used for this kind of thing. Only between one and three per cent are actually checked worldwide,” said Dominick Donald, a senior analyst in maritime terrorism with Aegis Defence Services in London.

“So your chance of getting stuff through is very good,” he said.

Mr Donald said although the cache was small, it illustrated how easily illicit weapons, supplies and even operatives could be smuggled around the world by sea.

In Oct 2002 Italian police discovered an Egyptian national hiding inside a shipping container fitted out as makeshift home. He was discovered in a routine search at the port of Gioai Tauro, southern Italy, on a ship en route from Egypt to Toronto.

“A month after 9/11 a magistrate said there wasn’t enough evidence to hold him despite a couple of sketch maps of airports in north America,” said Mr Donald, adding that he was bailed and subsequently vanished.

Since the Sept 11 attacks, the multi-billion dollar maritime industry has introduced a raft of security measures, including the Container Security Initiative (CSI). US fears remain, however, with some 35 million containers estimated to be in use globally.

“What they are worried about is that there is a nuclear device somewhere out there that someone is going to smuggle in (thriller writer) Tom Clancy-style and set it off in Baltimore or New York,” said Mr Donald.

“It is a concern that they have got to address and it is very much driving the CSI agenda,” he said. John Pike, director of US-based GlobalSecurity.Org, said the discovery hinted at the scale of the illicit movement of arms via containers.—Reuters