Sometimes they transported them by sea, smuggling drugs in fishing boats or dispatching them in submersibles.
Italy increased its air and sea surveillance of the sea smuggling route after a boat capsized last October off the southern island of Lampedusa, killing more than 360 people.
Some maritime smuggling along the Adriatic Sea also occurred, although large-scale sea smuggling was difficult to hide from the U.N. and NATO warships charged with enforcing the arms embargo.
This navy's tasks would be to check terrorism on the high seas, smuggling and piracy, and provide humanitarian aid worldwide in catastrophic conditions, as Mullen envisaged it.
While a flood of new agents and bolstered fencing has pushed much of the crossings to the eastern deserts and the sea, where smuggling by boat is a growing problem, people still regularly climb over, tunnel under or cut through the fence, sometimes with blowtorches and sophisticated cutting tools.
But the alliance has had long-standing roles to help in emergencies, and to prevent other illegal activities at sea, like smuggling and terrorism.
For those not familiar with pangas, they are small, open-hulled fishing boats that have been crossing the U.S.-Mexican sea border, smuggling migrant workers or marijuana on all night trips into the United States.
The movie, which won the Silver Bear for best screenwriting in Berlin, was shot at Panahi's villa on the Caspian sea and smuggled out of the country.
United States warships, as part of a multinational force, have been trying for several years to curb sea-borne smuggling, stopping some barges and other vessels in international waters in the Persian Gulf, Administration officials said.
Three men convicted in 2004 of smuggling sea bass and rock lobster from South Africa were ordered on Friday by a federal court to pay that nation $22.5 million in restitution, the largest amount ever awarded for such a crime.
According to many experts, a significant portion is obtained through criminal activities, involving sea piracy, human smuggling, drug trafficking, and gunrunning.
