The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The Office of the Attorney General (OAG) has forwarded the smuggling case, where 15 kgs of gold was sneaked in from across the northern border, to the Paro District Court on 26 October.
The Royal Bhutan Army soldiers based at the Ghunitsawa outpost in Paro district arrested two of three suspects involved.
On 30 September at around 12:15 am RBA soldiers in Ghunitshawa caught Thinley, 40, and Dawa Tshering, 28, with 15 gold biscuits weighing 15 kg. Dawa Tshering absconded from the spot but was later arrested with the third suspect, Tashi Gyaltshen, 39. The case was handed over to the Paro Police station on 5 October.
According to police, Tashi Gyeltshen is the prime suspect and he had hired the two others as carriers promising to pay Nu 11,000 each. As per the instruction given by the prime suspect Tashi Gyaltshen, on 29 September, Thinley and Dawa Tshering went to Phari, Tibet, to collect the gold from a man named Tshering Namgyel from Phari.
Tashi Gyeltshen had met Tshering Namgyel when he was doing business in Phari. Two of them started contacting each other through Wechat since 23 September and Tashi Gyeltshen sent two people to collect the gold on 29 September.
When the three suspects were arrested the rate of the gold as per the Royal Monetary Authority (RMA) was Nu 3097.8 a 1 gram. All three suspects are farmers from Paro Tsento.
