Illegal tobacco seizures collapsed by more than three-quarters in 2019 as smugglers copied sophisticated techniques from the drugs trade in an effort to avoid detection, new figures show. Just €10.5 million in cigarettes and other tobacco products were seized by Revenue last year, compared to some €42.2 million in 2018. Revenue said it had noted a “shift away from the large-scale smuggling of tobacco products in shipping containers to smaller amounts of tobacco products being smuggled in sophisticated concealments traditionally associated with drug smuggling”. A shipping container can hold between seven and eight million cigarettes, Revenue said. A Revenue spokesman said it is “alert to the resourcefulness of those involved in criminality in the supply of illicit tobacco products and responded effectively to this change in concealment methods”.

Source: The Irish Times February 03, 2020 01:52 UTC