Buletin TV3 reported him as saying in an interview that this was followed by diesel seizures involving 734 cases.

Azman said smuggling syndicates switched their focus to RON95 petrol after the government’s rationalisation of diesel subsidies.

“Once we started banning foreign vehicles from freely buying petrol and diesel at petrol stations, the syndicates started using local vehicles to make repeated purchases.

“When we released a directive banning repeated purchases, they started using extra tanks in their vehicles,” he said.

The scope of the operation, which saw 616 arrests this year, covered diesel, RON95 petrol, 1kg packets of cooking oil, white sugar, wheat flour and liquefied petroleum gas.

In total, controlled and subsidised goods worth around RM90.8 million were seized from Jan 1 this year.

Azman said syndicates trading in cooking oil mainly used falsified documents, claiming that the oil had been sent to certain locations when they were moved elsewhere instead.

He said they used closed lorries to smuggle subsidised cooking oil to neighbouring countries for sale at higher prices.