Legislation, Lithuania, Markets and Companies, Transport

Photo: cust.lt

Tobacco products remained last year the most popular smuggled commodity. Last year, the customs officers seized 16 million packages of cigarettes and 3 tons of tobacco worth EUR 13 million. The amount of tobacco seized in 2013 was similar: 117 million pcs. of cigarettes and 1.6 tons of tobacco.

The greatest quantities of tobacco products were seized on the Lithuanian – Belarusian border. Cigarettes bearing the banderols of the Republic of Belarus comprised over half the amount of tobacco seized by the Lithuanian customs officers.

In order to avoid customs control, the traffickers of cigarettes hide cigarette boxes in specially made hiding-places or under different "cover" loads. Last year, there was an attempt to mask large shipments of smuggled cigarettes with potato sacks, canned beef, beer bottles, outdoor swings, frozen fish. The customs officers also found boxes of smuggled tobacco among fish processing equipment and industrial vacuum cleaners. The officers are discovering more and more illegally carried tobacco products thanks to x-ray control systems. In 2014, these systems were put into use in all customs posts on the external EU border.

Over 200 pre-trial investigations of tobacco smuggling were initiated last year, the Lithuanian Customs said.