The Musina SAPS and the Zimbabwean police made a breakthrough when they arrested a total of 405 suspects, among them suspected smugglers, armed robbers, touts and border jumpers, during a massive joint operation in Beitbridge town in Zimbabwe last weekend.

The station commander for the Beitbridge police in Zimbabwe, Chief Superintendent Nicholas Mawere, told Mirror that, during the operation, the joint police teams also raided a house in the border town area of Dulibadzimu suburb, where they recovered 1 800 bricks of Zimbabwean cigarettes branded Remington Gold hidden inside the house.

"We arrested 405 suspects during our joint operation with our South African counterparts and we also recovered 1 800 bricks of cigarettes, stashed at a house in Dulibadzimu," he said.

Mawere said they suspected the owner of the cigarettes intended to smuggle the contraband into South Africa.

"As police, we suspect the owner wanted to smuggle the cigarettes into South Africa through undesignated entry points along the Limpopo River. Moreover, she also failed to produce the licence, which eventually led to her being arrested," he said.

The routine operations are part of a bilateral agreement between South Africa and Zimbabwe, following a decision arrived at during a security meeting between officials from Limpopo, Matabeleland South and Masvingo provinces, in the Matopos area in the neighbouring country in June.

Last month, Musina SAPS spokeswoman, Const Deborah Bob said, the two forces rounded up 2 708 suspects during a similar exercise.

The suspects, who included armed robbers targeting border jumpers along the crocodile-infested Limpopo River, were also nabbed during the blitz.

Mawere said the joint operations called for police from South Africa to come into the Zimbabwean territory and carry out patrols with their counterparts. The Zimbabwean police also move into South Africa for joint patrols.

"These joint patrols are aimed at fighting cross-border crime syndicates operating between South Africa and Zimbabwe and therefore we are happy because they (the joint operations) are now paying dividends as criminals are finding it difficult to commit an offence and flee into either South Africa or Zimbabwe and we expect to make more arrests as we continue with the exercise," he said.