employees of the National Revenue Service (VID) Customs Administration and the State Border Guard Service prevented the import of 209,600 contraband cigarettes into Latvian territory. Illegal cargo was discovered while checking freight trains at Latvia’s borders with Russia and Belarus.
On May 25, employees of the Zilupe customs checkpoint inspected a freight train en route to Latvia from Russia. The composition of the train was checked using an X-ray cargo screening device.
Analyzing the images from the scans, customs officers suspected that there was also undeclared goods in the grain shipment.
During a thorough check, the customs officers discover packets of contraband cigarettes. They contained 67,200 “NZ” and “Queen” cigarettes with Belarusian excise stamps and 42,420 “Kenzo” cigarettes without an excise stamp.
A total of 109,600 cigarettes or 5,480 packets of cigarettes were seized.
On Thursday, the smuggling of cigarettes from Belarus was also stopped. At the customs checkpoint of Indra, while checking the composition of the train, the employees of the State Border Service noticed that plastic bags containing cigarettes were attached to the walls of the empty hopper cars.
Together with customs officials, a thorough check was carried out, as a result of which 100,000 cigarettes or 5,000 packs of “NZ”, “Minsk” and “Queen” cigarettes with Belarusian excise stamps were seized.
The case materials were submitted to the VID Tax and Customs Police Department for decision to initiate criminal proceedings.
Source: delfi
