"We believe that far more should be done to keep smuggled goods out of the UK, " they said.

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The Terminal Manager at Lagos's Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Olutayo Oginnie, said some of the abandoned planes were seized for transporting smuggled goods.

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Hamstrung by their own restrictions which prevent them buying smuggled goods, the UN and other international agencies have written themselves out of the repair effort.

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There were some clever costumes (furs, black-and-white polka-dot flamenco dresses, natty gangster suits for the smugglers) and ideas (the smuggled "goods" were people).

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Many goods are smuggled from Egypt through a network of underground tunnels into Gaza.

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Others buy goods in neighbouring countries where traders have smuggled them in from Congo and have arranged dodgy paperwork to make the deals look legal.

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Warming ties with Baghdad in the past few years have put the country on a vital drip feed, as oil smuggled out of Iraq has been exchanged for Syrian consumer goods.

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"About 80% of the goods, in my estimate, that come under the trade agreement are smuggled back through Pakistan's large porous border, " he said.

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