Last Thursday, May 19, the Chamber of Senators, approved with modifications the bill that “Implements the obligation to have a scanner in operation 24 hours a day, in public and private ports that allow increasing efficiency in the fight against organized crime, in terms of drug trafficking, arms trafficking and smuggling.
The document went to the Chamber of Deputies now for study.
Julio Fernández, head of Customs, in an interview with channel 5Días, stated that the original proposal worried them because it established that all ports have scanners, giving them only three months to acquire them.
“It was going to be an unfeasible law, but this modified law is reasonable. It proposes that the State, through Customs, budget for the purchase. A year is short anyway, but we already have time to move, ”he explained.
Paraguay, although it is Mediterranean, has 35 ports. Among them, dry ports, borders, rivers and roads. With the modifications, instead of each one acquiring the scanners, the State, through Customs, will acquire them free of charge. The ports will only have to pay for maintenance.
These scanners will be implemented primarily to control products leaving the country bound for Europe. Customs estimates that in 70 days it will put the first four scanners into operation.
