The Gold Rush

The Soviet Union boasts some of the tightest border controls in the world, but they are not tight enough to hold back a thriving network of Russian dealers in contraband currency that stretches from Peking to Paris and points beyond. Last week a Kazakhstan factory owner went on trial in Alma Ata after he was nabbed wearing a money belt crammed not only with rubles but also with French francs and U.S. dollars. In his home were three ounces of pearls, 2,700 antelope horns, which the Chinese prize for their supposed medicinal qualities, and 22 Ibs. of gold, which he planned to export to accomplices in Communist China. Using a mine detector, cops found another cache of gold buried in the gutter in front of the smuggler's house.

Last month another ring of prospering foreign traders was broken up in the Moslem Soviet Republic of Uzbekistan. Alas, a railroad policeman was on the platform of Tashkent's station when coins clinked at the feet of an elderly beggar. The cop discovered that the coins were solid gold and bore the face of Czar Nicholas II.

Sewn into the beggar's rags were coins, pearls and precious stones.

The trail led to four other gang members, whose illicit inventory included 400 Ibs. of precious aniline dyes, 220 yards of satin, $200 in British pounds, and hundreds of thousands of rubles in state loan certificates, rubies, coins and medals. A crook named "Blue Eyes" was all set to haul the swag out by car to Afghanistan. The gang had hoped to use the profits to finance a pilgrimage to Mecca. Instead, they all landed in a Tashkent jail, sentenced to terms of 10 to 15 years.

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