Smugglers
Smuggling is the illegal transportation of objects, substances, information or people, such as out of a house or buildings, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations. There are various motivations to smuggle. These include the participation in illegal trade, such as in the drug trade, illegal weapons trade, prostitution, human trafficking, kidnapping, exotic wildlife trade, art theft, heists, chop shops, illegal immigration or illegal emigration, tax evasion, import/export restrictions, providing contraband to prison inmates, or the theft of the items being smuggled. Smuggling is a common theme in literature, from Bizet's opera ''Carmen'' to the James Bond spy books (and later films) '' Diamonds Are Forever'' and '' Goldfinger''. Etymology The verb ''smuggle'', from Low German ''smuggeln'' or Dutch ''smokkelen'' (="to transport (goods) illegally"), apparently a frequentative formation of a word meaning "to sneak", ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Illegal Drug Trade
The illegal drug trade or drug trafficking is a global black market dedicated to the cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of prohibited drugs. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs through the use of drug prohibition laws. The think tank Global Financial Integrity's ''Transnational Crime and the Developing World'' report estimates the size of the global illicit drug market between US$426 and US$652billion in 2014 alone. With a world GDP of US$78 trillion in the same year, the illegal drug trade may be estimated as nearly 1% of total global trade. Consumption of illegal drugs is widespread globally and it remains very difficult for local authorities to thwart its popularity. History The government of the Qing Dynasty issued edicts against opium smoking in 1730, 1796 and 1800. The West prohibited addictive drugs throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Beginning in the 18th century, British merchants fro ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Carmen (opera)
''Carmen'' () is an opera in four acts by the French composer Georges Bizet. The libretto was written by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the Carmen (novella), novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée. The opera was first performed by the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875, where its breaking of conventions shocked and scandalised its first audiences. Bizet died suddenly after the 33rd performance, unaware that the work would achieve international acclaim within the following ten years. ''Carmen'' has since become one of the most popular and frequently performed operas in the classical Western canon, canon; the "Habanera (aria), Habanera" from act 1 and the "Toreador Song" from act 2 are among the best known of all operatic arias. The opera is written in the genre of ''opéra comique'' with musical numbers separated by dialogue. It is set in southern Spain and tells the story of the downfall of Don José, a naïve soldier who is seduced by the wiles of th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Wildlife Smuggling
Wildlife smuggling or trafficking involves the illegal gathering, transportation, and distribution of animals and their derivatives. This can be done either internationally or domestically. Estimates of the money generated by wildlife smuggling vary, in part because of its illegal nature. "Wildlife smuggling is estimated at $7.8bn to $10bn a year, according to the U.S. State Department. The U.S. State Department also lists wildlife trafficking as the third most valuable illicit commerce in the world." The illegal nature of such activities makes determining the amount of money involved incredibly difficult. When considered with illegal timber and fisheries, wildlife trafficking is a major illegal trade along with narcotics, human trafficking, and counterfeit products. Products demanded by the trade include exotic pets, food, traditional medicine, clothing, and jewelry made from animals' tusks, fins, skins, shells, horns, and internal organs. Smuggled wildlife is an increasing glo ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Illegal Immigration
Illegal immigration is the migration of people into a country in violation of the immigration laws of that country or the continued residence without the legal right to live in that country. Illegal immigration tends to be financially upward, from poorer to richer countries. Illegal residence in another country creates the risk of detention, deportation, and/or other sanctions. Asylum seekers who are denied asylum may face impediment to expulsion if the home country refuses to receive the person or if new asylum evidence emerges after the decision. In some cases, these people are considered illegal aliens, and in others, they may receive a temporary residence permit, for example with reference to the principle of non-refoulement in the international Refugee Convention. The European Court of Human Rights, referring to the European Convention on Human Rights, has shown in a number of indicative judgments that there are enforcement barriers to expulsion to certain countri ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Diamonds Are Forever (novel)
''Diamonds Are Forever'' is the fourth novel by the British author Ian Fleming to feature his fictional British Secret Service agent James Bond. Fleming wrote the story at his Goldeneye estate in Jamaica, inspired by a ''Sunday Times'' article on diamond smuggling. The book was first published by Jonathan Cape in the United Kingdom on 26 March 1956. The story centres on Bond's investigation of a diamond-smuggling operation that originates in the mines of Sierra Leone and runs to Las Vegas. Along the way Bond meets and falls in love with one of the members of the smuggling gang, Tiffany Case. Much of Fleming's background research formed the basis for his non-fiction 1957 book '' The Diamond Smugglers''. ''Diamonds Are Forever'' deals with international travel, marriage and the transitory nature of life. As with Fleming's previous novels, ''Diamonds Are Forever'' received broadly positive reviews at the time of publication. The story was serialised in the '' Daily Express'' n ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Illegal Weapons Trade
Arms trafficking or gunrunning is the illicit trade of contraband small arms and ammunition, which constitutes part of a broad range of illegal activities often associated with transnational Criminal Organizations, criminal organizations. The illegal trade of small arms, unlike other organized crime commodities, is more closely associated with exercising power in communities instead of achieving economic gain. Scholars estimate illegal arms transactions amount to over US$1 billion annually. To keep track of imports and exports of several of the most dangerous armament categories, the United Nations, in 1991, created a Register for Conventional Arms. Participation, however, is not compulsory, and lacks comprehensive data in regions outside of Europe. Africa, due to a prevalence of corrupt officials and loosely enforced trade regulations, is a region with extensive illicit arms activity. In a resolution to complement the Register with legally binding obligations, a Firearms Protoc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Illegal Emigration
Illegal emigration is departure from a country in violation of emigration laws. Countries often seek to regulate who departs a country for diverse reasons, such as stopping criminals from leaving, preventing labor shortages and capital flight, and averting brain drain. The simplest case is when a country prohibits certain persons from physically leaving. Another common situation is when a person legally goes abroad but refuses to return when demanded by his or her country of origin. Special cases are when one flees a country as a refugee escaping persecution or, after committing a crime, trying to escape prosecution. However, a person who enters another country as an illegal immigrant may be sent back, and if a criminal, a person may face extradition or prosecution in the other country. The position of the United Nations is that freedom to emigrate is a human right, part of the right to freedom of movement. According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, "Everyone has t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Goldfinger (novel)
''Goldfinger'' is the seventh novel in Ian Fleming's James Bond series. Written in January and February 1958, it was first published in the UK by Jonathan Cape on 23 March 1959. The story centres on the investigation by the British Secret Service operative James Bond into the gold smuggling activities of Auric Goldfinger, who is also suspected by MI6 of being connected to SMERSH, the Soviet counter-intelligence organisation. As well as establishing the background to the smuggling operation, Bond uncovers a much larger plot: Goldfinger plans to steal the gold reserves of the United States from Fort Knox. Fleming developed the James Bond character in ''Goldfinger'', presenting him as a more complex individual than in the previous novels, and bringing out a theme of Bond as a St George figure. This theme is echoed by the fact that it is a British agent sorting out an American problem. In common with his other Bond stories, Fleming used the names of people he knew, or knew o ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Low German
: : : : : (70,000) (30,000) (8,000) , familycolor = Indo-European , fam2 = Germanic , fam3 = West Germanic , fam4 = North Sea Germanic , ancestor = Old Saxon , ancestor2 = Middle Low German , dia1 = West Low German , dia2 = East Low German , iso2 = nds , iso3 = nds , iso3comment = (Dutch varieties and Westphalian have separate codes) , lingua = 52-ACB , map = Nds Spraakrebeet na1945.svg , mapcaption = Present day Low German language area in Europe. , glotto = lowg1239 , glottoname = Low German , notice = IPA Low German or Low Saxon (in the language itself: , and other names; german: Plattdeutsch, ) is a West Germanic language variety spoken mainly in Northern Germany and the northeastern part of the Netherlands. The dialect of Plautdietsch is also spoken in the Russian Mennonite diaspora wor ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dutch Language
Dutch ( ) is a West Germanic language spoken by about 25 million people as a first language and 5 million as a second language. It is the third most widely spoken Germanic language, after its close relatives German and English. '' Afrikaans'' is a separate but somewhat mutually intelligible daughter languageAfrikaans is a daughter language of Dutch; see , , , , , . Afrikaans was historically called Cape Dutch; see , , , , , . Afrikaans is rooted in 17th-century dialects of Dutch; see , , , . Afrikaans is variously described as a creole, a partially creolised language, or a deviant variety of Dutch; see . spoken, to some degree, by at least 16 million people, mainly in South Africa and Namibia, evolving from the Cape Dutch dialects of Southern Africa. The dialects used in Belgium (including Flemish) and in Suriname, meanwhile, are all guided by the Dutch Language Union. In Europe, most of the population of the Netherlands (where it is the only official language sp ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Frequentative
In grammar, a frequentative form ( abbreviated or ) of a word is one that indicates repeated action but is not to be confused with iterative aspect. The frequentative form can be considered a separate but not completely independent word called a frequentative. The frequentative is no longer productive in English, unlike in some language groups, such as Finno-Ugric, Balto-Slavic, and Turkic. English English has ''-le'' and -''er'' as frequentative suffixes. Some frequentative verbs surviving in English, and their parent verbs are listed below. Additionally, some frequentative verbs are formed by reduplication of a monosyllable (e.g., ''coo-cooing'', ''cf.'' Latin ''murmur''). Frequentative nouns are often formed by combining two different vowel grades of the same word (as in ''teeter-totter'', ''pitter-patter'', ''chitchat''.) The present tense in English usually has a frequentative meaning. For example, "I walk to work" means "I walk to work most days" and is true ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Prison
A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correctional facility, lock-up, hoosegow or remand center, is a facility in which inmates (or prisoners) are confined against their will and usually denied a variety of freedoms under the authority of the state as punishment for various crimes. Prisons are most commonly used within a criminal justice system: people charged with crimes may be imprisoned until their trial; those pleading or being found guilty of crimes at trial may be sentenced to a specified period of imprisonment. In simplest terms, a prison can also be described as a building in which people are legally held as a punishment for a crime they have committed. Prisons can also be used as a tool of political repression by authoritarian regimes. Their perceived opponents may b ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |