[Presenter] The Gdansk Delegature of the State Protection Office [UOP] has revealed the background to a completed investigation into the largest arms smuggling case in Poland. The value of the illegally exported equipment reaches 4.5m dollars. Six people associated with the Warsaw firms Cenrex and (?Steo) are awaiting trial.

[Reporter] At the start of the 1990s, the Polish military, which was seeking entry to NATO, started to dispose of outdated armaments. The heads and partners of the two companies found a way to extract liquidity out of unpopular goods. Maintaining all the appearances of legality and using the container terminal in Gdynia, they sent several loads of arms and ammunition from military ordinance depots away by sea. The end user of the equipment was to have been Latvia. However, when the ships were on the way to Riga, the arms were transferred to earlier prepared empty containers. From there, the dubious loads went to their recipients, which were criminal groups in Estonia.

[Capt Stanislaw Kaminski, UOP Gdansk Delegature] The export of these arms was very profitable, due to the prices received. It was sold in Poland for 25 dollars, whereas in Estonia it got prices ranging from 190 to 250 dollars. Apart from that, due to the technical parameters of the [?TT] pistols, their force and intensity, they were willingly used by criminals over there.

[Reporter] Some of the pistols distributed this way, the so-called [?TT] pistols, were found in Poland, in Russia and even in Japan. Three other loads using the same channel ended up in Yugoslavia and Somalia. Both these countries were covered by UN Organization embargoes. The whole case was uncovered due to the excellent collaboration of investigative bodies in Poland, Latvia and Estonia.

[Mariusz Marciniak, Regional Prosecutor's Office in Gdansk] It was only a comparison of these documents in the three individual countries that was able to bring about the obtaining of information witnessing to the fact that these were illegal deliveries. Only this, for if arms and agricultural and food products are exported from Poland, and just agricultural and food products arrive in Estonia, then there can be no miracles - something must have ensued on the way. And that something was this illegal delivery, camouflaged under agricultural and food supplies.

[Reporter] After several months under arrest, all the six Poles suspected of illegally trading in arms have been released on bail. They face punishments of up to 12 years imprisonment.

Source: TV Polonia satellite service, Warsaw, in Polish 1830 gmt 5 Jan 00

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The operation, which involved several ex-employees of Polish arms trading companies and an army major, was discovered in 1996.

Mariusz Marciniak from the Gdansk prosecution said the defendants may receive prison sentences between 3 and 12 years.