The government says the shed where guns were stolen is privately owned.

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – The Trinidad and Tobago government has sought to distance itself from suggestions that “packages of interest identified by international law enforcement to contain illegal weapons” that disappeared from a transit shed belonged to the Customs Division.

In a statement, Finance Minister Colm Imbert said that “the patently erroneous headline” regarding his statement made in the Senate earlier this week about the missing guns gave the impression that the transit sheds he spoke about belonged to the Customs.

“These misstatements give the false impression that the Minister of Finance said yesterday in Parliament that there is poor security at bonded warehouses or transit sheds owned and operated by the Customs and Excise Division, and, therefore, the Customs and Excise Division has been negligent.

“The truth is the transit sheds that the Minister of Finance referred to are owned and operated by PRIVATE COMPANIES, and it is because the Customs and Excise Division discovered that security systems were non-functional, packages had disappeared, and record-keeping was poor at these PRIVATE facilities, that these PRIVATE transit sheds were closed, temporarily, until their owners remedied the defects in their security systems and records,” Imbert said in his statement.

He said this “unfortunate situation has contributed to the current congestion in the clearing of cargo at this time of the year since the space for inspection of air cargo, specifically courier cargo, is now very limited due to the closure of these PRIVATE transit sheds.”

The Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) had carried the story about the missing guns at the transit shed under the headline “Guns missing from Customs Shed. “In contrast, the Trinidad Express newspaper headlined “Gun Theft at Customs.”

In his statement to the Senate, Imbert had said, “One transit shed was closed down because its security systems were non-functional and unknown persons broke in, tampered with packages and removed items, which we suspect are illegal items such as guns and ammunition.”

Imbert said that at one transit shed, he was informed that the authorities were unaware that persons had broken in and stolen things from their packages because their security systems were not working.

He said at another, “The Customs was tracking packages of interest identified by international law enforcement to contain illegal weapons, and these packages disappeared from that transit shed. They still cannot be found. That (transit shed) was shut down as well,” without indicating when the guns were stolen.

“You see, you never hear about these things because making complete public statements for security reasons is inappropriate. But I thought it necessary to say these things now. One hand can’t clap,” Imbert said, adding that the Keith Rowley government is doing “the best it can, but the couriers do not wish to provide advance package information, and the security systems are not of the best.”.