More than 57m cigarettes and 48 tons of cut tobacco destined for the UK market has been seized in Belgium.
In an ‘action day’, organised by Belgian Customs (Algemene Administratie van Douane en Accijnzen/Administration Générale des Douanes et Accises) with support from Europol, tobacco products with a total tax value of more than €32m were seized.
According to Europol, the market value of the seized cigarettes amounts to around €73m in the United Kingdom, the presumed country of distribution for the majority of the products.
Belgian customs authorities carried out searches based on intelligence provided by the Lithuanian Criminal Police Bureau on suspicious deliveries to addresses in Belgium. The authorities also discovered two full production lines for cigarettes bearing a variety of well-known name brands.
Law enforcement agencies were also able to secure a massive number of empty packages, filters, cigarette paper, glue, cardboard and packaging film, as well as seven new machines intended for a new production and packaging line.
Along with confiscating massive amounts of material used for counterfeit cigarette production, authorities seized various vehicles and arrested several persons of Lithuanian, Polish, Ukrainian and Jordanian nationality.
This year alone, five illegal tobacco production sites and 15 storage warehouses have been uncovered and dismantled by Belgian authorities. This has led to more than 274m cigarettes, 88 tons of cut tobacco, 65 tons of water pipe tobacco and 40 tons of raw tobacco being confiscated.
The total payables on these seized illicit tobacco products - consisting of the excise duty, special excise duty and value added tax - totals more than €139m.
Europol believes factors such as its proximity to the French and British borders, rising excise duty rates in neighbouring countries, and short distances to certain black markets, have together led to Belgium becoming a major hub for illegal tobacco production and trade.
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